Real wood flooring - Oak

foolishboy

Hi all,

Just about to embark on an extension and interior re jigging so flooring is coming into focus. Missus has requested that I look into real oak flooring for the entire ground floor so I've started looking around.

Seems to vary wildly in price with an apparent premium for polished/oiled over lacquered. Can someone explain the basics of what to look for? How good is the cheaper stuff vs premium? Minimum thickness to consider? What do you use for underlay? Any recommended suppliers? I suspect we'll need in the region of 50sqm of the stuff so it's not going to be a cheap job

Cheers!
FB

sillygoose

I suppose more expensive Oak has been properly aged.. hopefully! although its hard to tell from looking at it. As I found out doing a large bedroom, newish Oak can shrink astonishingly - by several inches! endless hassle. Fortunately I had laid the floor as a 'floating' layer so was able to add extra on the edges and after a few years its now stable (although the joints widen and tighten visibly with the seasons a bit)

Its oiled and minimal maintenance, a clean and wipe over with oil every year at most. Non slip, resists marks, warm and looks fantastic.

Doozergirl

I've used solid before but I prefer engineered these days as it doesn't shrink as much and it's also not as expensive to lay! For the same price as solid you will get longer, wider planks which are what make a floor look more expensive.

And it's worth buying it ready lacquered as again you won't save anything in treating the unfinished stuff and you are guaranteed a clean finish because what you see is what you get when you buy it.

I won some really expensive unfinished oak once and it twisted all over the place and looked totally crap once my husband had tried to stain it (aaargh!) Had a more successful time with pre-finished but again, we ended up quite quickly with a lot of gaps where it was moving about. I have engineered through the downstairs of my own house now.

MsAnderson

We did our entire ground floor in timberjack solid oak from Howdens and used the self stick underlay from b&q. The oak flooring is fab, I spent a lot of time checking out finishes, widths, etc and decided to go with howdens, got a great deal as we needed about 130sqm.

The sticky underlay is great once you get the first few lengths set. The area has to be very clean and free of dust and grit, so lay it in your socks and put knees pads on. You spend a lot of time sliding about the floor!

Floor is very solid and stable, easy to clean and still as good as new despite best efforts of 3 labradors, it's been down for 2 years.

Ionkontrol

Cheap oak floors come in random lengths. Some of them are really short eg. 300mm, meaning you will have loads of joins near each other, making the floor look cheap. Go for wide board engineered. They come in 2metre + lengths.

foolishboy

Thanks everyone, interesting opinions!

..checking out the engineered stuff now.

RE: Howdens .. how do you get prices from them? Website says nothing!

Cheers,
FB

MsAnderson

Howdens are trade only, so you'll need to find someone with an account. However, I have heard that some branches are doing non-trade transactions just to get the business. Find your nearest branch and pop in and ask. You will be able to see the samples there too.

Oh, and BTW, random lengths of flooring does not make a floor look cheap. A badly laid floor will make a floor look cheap. And if you have lots of short lengths together so the joints are close, then the person that laid the floor is an idiot. IMHO.

Doozergirl

MsAnderson wrote: »

Howdens are trade only, so you'll need to find someone with an account. However, I have heard that some branches are doing non-trade transactions just to get the business. Find your nearest branch and pop in and ask. You will be able to see the samples there too.

Oh, and BTW, random lengths of flooring does not make a floor look cheap. A badly laid floor will make a floor look cheap. And if you have lots of short lengths together so the joints are close, then the person that laid the floor is an idiot. IMHO.

It is true though that shorter lengths and thinner boards are cheaper so in order to look like you've paid more, you do want longer, wider boards. Which is why I now go for longer, wider engineered than the Howdens solid mix (which I have also used and managed to get for a really good price - around £19 + VAT but also contains more knots; which is fine if you prefer a more rustic look).

MrsE_2

If you do go for solid oak (which is IMHO the best) don't float it like laminate.

You can buy a special latex glue & instead of being a floating floor, it becomes part of the house (like parquet).

aa4466

Another big choice is whether to go for lacquered or oiled. Lacquered is the low maintenance option but very hard to repair if you scratch it. The only way to make it perfect again is to sand the floor and re-lacquer it. For that reason I am going to go for oiled. If you scratch it then you can sand just that area and re-oil it.

aa4466

Another thing, if you are going to have underfloor heating in your extension then go for engineered as it will cope with the temperature changes much better than solid wood. If you are going for engineered then the thicker the wear layer the better as it means you can sand it several times over its lifetime.