Engineered Flooring

What is Engineered Wood Flooring

Engineered wood flooring offers a very stable wood floor with a huge choice of textures, colours, finishes and widths of plank. The engineered backing gives a very stable base for the solid wood surface. It is well suited to modern day living, accommodating temperature changes from central heating and humidity changes from kitchens.

Engineered wood flooring is not to be confused with laminate flooring. Where laminate floors consist of a paper thin veneer pattern on artificial backing material, engineered flooring consists of many layered tiers of ply wood/softwood bonded together under a real, solid, wood "wear layer" bonded top. Engineered floors are real wood, used in combinations that maximise strength and durability.

Engineered wood floor thicknesses range from 13mm-21mm with wear layers of 2.5mm to 6mm. A typical wear layer is 3.5mm on a 14mm/15mm thick plank and a 6mm on a 20mm/21mm thick plank, which is likely to last a lifetime and will allow several sandings.

Stability is achieved from the layers of ply backing running in different directions. It is identical to solid wooden flooring in appearance that you can see and walk on a real wood surface.

Wood is a natural product that absorbs and loses moisture, expanding and contracting in the process. Engineered wood flooring is less susceptible to this expansion and contraction issue associated with moisture and temperature fluctuations, which can cause problems with solid wood flooring.  This means that engineered wood flooring can be used more broadly and in more areas than solid wood flooring.