New flooring for our house - Laminate vs Other

andrewf75

I've had a similar dilemma, although I don't have dogs just a small child

Think I'm still going for engineered wood as even with a few dents, scratches etc I think I'd rather have it than laminate however realistic. Wood being natural doesn't have to be perfect and a bit of wear gives it character - within reason! Thats my thinking anyway....

ritesh

We chose engineered wood over real wood for the reasons mentioned above. They are stable! They look and feel just as good as real wood and you will never know the difference once it is down.

With regards to the actual surface of engineered wood being 3 to 4 mm of real wood please do not let this put you off. You will probably only end up sanding the wood once every 10 years and only then you will be removing 1 mm of the top layer. Therefore you are looking at least 30 years of life from the engineered wood flooring!

Consider this, theoretically you can only sand down to the tounge and groove joint so in effect you are looking at about 8 to 10 mm for real wood flooring or 3 to 4 mm engineered flooring.

If it helps we got our engineered wood flooring 8 years ago from Atkinson Kirby and it still looks every bit as good as it did when we first got it!

Hope this helps

gazfocus

rob7475 wrote: »

We've just had the same dilemma.

We were adament that we wanted real wood and not 'awful' laminate.

After getting loads of samples of engineered oak and solid wood and finding that they all scratched quite easily, we got some samples of quickstep perspective laminite. It was much more scratch resistant than the wood and looked great. The planks are wide and have a groove at the edges and the surface has a texture that makes it look more like real wood. We've had it down for nearly a year now with not a single scratch. Quickstep also do a repair kit with filler mathced to the colour should it ever scratch.

The perspective stuff is quite dear but well worth it in my opinion.

Hi Rob,

I had previously heard good things about Quickstep laminate so I've just ordered some samples of the range you suggested so will see what that's like when it comes.

We're certainly in no major rush to have anything fitted as we're having a bit of work done before the flooring needs to go down but it just seems like we're getting stuck on every project when major decisions need to be made

Ah well, we will get there in the end.

rob7475

gazfocus wrote: »

Hi Rob,

I had previously heard good things about Quickstep laminate so I've just ordered some samples of the range you suggested so will see what that's like when it comes.

We're certainly in no major rush to have anything fitted as we're having a bit of work done before the flooring needs to go down but it just seems like we're getting stuck on every project when major decisions need to be made

Ah well, we will get there in the end.

We got the oak plank with saw cuts (UFW1548) - it looks great. Not sure if you've found a supplier, but flooringsupplies.co.uk were the cheapest when we got ours with free delivery and free underlay.

http://www.flooringsupplies.co.uk/laminate/10433/quickstep_perspective_oak_plank_saw_cuts_nature_ufw1548_laminate_floor

gazfocus

rob7475 wrote: »

We got the oak plank with saw cuts (UFW1548) - it looks great. Not sure if you've found a supplier, but flooringsupplies.co.uk were the cheapest when we got ours with free delivery and free underlay.

http://www.flooringsupplies.co.uk/laminate/10433/quickstep_perspective_oak_plank_saw_cuts_nature_ufw1548_laminate_floor

Thanks Rob, yeah that's where I've ordered samples from. Gone for UF918, UF860 and UF896 (can't see what the difference is between UF and UL models though).

Rottensocks

I have had samples of this stuff and thought was nice quality http://www.ukflooringdirect.co.uk/Laminate.htm?143=10mm

also, Kaindl do a decent quality range too.

rob7475

gazfocus wrote: »

Thanks Rob, yeah that's where I've ordered samples from. Gone for UF918, UF860 and UF896 (can't see what the difference is between UF and UL models though).

The ones that start in UF have a bevel running all way round the board so you get a v groove all way round

The UL ones only have the bevel along the long edges.

Can you tell I spent a lot of time looking for flooring!!! :rotfl: