As a wood, oak is one of the toughest and most popular flooring options you can choose. A tree that takes decades and decades to grow, the oak tree is not only accepted as a really strong option for flooring and furnishing, it is also so much associated with strength and longevity that it is often used for company logos. Apart from being strong, oak looks great because it comes in such a huge variety of colours and tones. Hailing from both sides of the Atlantic, oak flooring comes in two main flooring options; engineered and solid.
Engineered oak flooring is a real bonus for anyone who is seeking oak flooring but needs a solution that will stand up to temperature and moisture fluctuations, or will work over under floor heating. Thanks to its clever construction, engineered wood flooring doesn’t expand and contract to the same extent as solid wood flooring. Made up of layers of ply that are bonded together to create a really strong core board, engineered flooring’s really special feature is the fact that it’s topped off with solid oak, making the end result look just like solid wood.
Many people confuse engineered wood flooring with laminate flooring and the two simply couldn’t be more different. Engineered wood flooring is made from wood and laminate flooring is typically made from man made materials and incorporates what is no more than a photocopy of wood that makes it look like the real thing (but from a distance). Although engineered wood flooring is made differently from solid wood flooring, it is still made from wood and looks just like solid wood, which is one of its major attractions.
If you want an oak floor in one of the rooms in your home but you have a challenging environment or under floor heating, there is no getting away from the fact that engineered oak flooring is the way to go. Normally topped off with a solid oak lamella, or top layer, it’ll take a real keen eye to tell the difference between engineered and solid oak flooring. Basically, if you’re re-flooring your bathroom or kitchen or if you have any fear of moisture or temperature fluctuations, the likelihood is that solid wood flooring simply won’t be an option for you.
The reason that solid wood flooring isn’t recommended where there are temperature and moisture fluctuations is because dampness and rises and falls in temperature cause wood to expand and contract. While it is completely normal for wood to expand and contract, if it is forced to do so excessively because of its environment, it is at risk of damage. Damage caused by wood excessively expanding and contracting is typically cupping, bowing or excess gaps in the floor. The same is true if you have under floor heating. Because of the expansion and contraction caused by your heating, solid wood flooring isn’t normally considered the right option, so you should definitely look at engineered oak.
The two most common types of oak flooring on offer today are American oak and European oak. European oak is normally found in brown tones and can be anything from a light brown to a dark brown colour. Relatively resistant to expansion and contraction, European oak is low in sap and is normally available in long and wide boards because of the size of the tree. American oak, as the name suggests, comes from the other side of the Atlantic and apart from brown tones, also comes in white shades. Hailing from the North of America, American oak trees tend to be shorter and broader than European oaks, which means that they’re perfect for the production of really broad flooring boards. In many cases there is little difference in cost or look of American and European oak engineered flooring, but people in this neck of the woods tend to either opt for European because it comes from closer to home or it is exactly the shade they’re after.
Although oak is a tough and hardwearing wood, there’s no getting away from the fact that when you invest in a new floor, you want to know that it’ll last a very long time. When you buy engineered oak flooring, your supplier will tell you the thickness of the oak lamella or top layer. The thickness of the oak top layer of the engineered wood flooring you choose will determine how often you can sand the flooring. Not surprisingly, the thicker the lamella or top layer, the more often you will be able to re-sand and re-finish the floor.