One of the key areas to ask about when shopping for laminate and engineered wood floors is the core layer, which we talk about a bit on our 5 Things You Need To Know Before You Buy Laminate Flooring video. The materials typically used in the making of a core layer is high-density fiberboard (HDF) and medium-density fiberboard (MDF). Given that it is an important aspect when it comes to the anatomy of a floor, and important when you’re buying floors, I thought it made sense to talk about it a bit.
Fiberboard is a wood byproduct, known as an engineered wood product because raw materials are taken and processed into a versatile and durable material. It’s used in flooring as core material, of course. But, it’s also used for furniture manufacturing, designed not to split or crack.
Fiberboard is made through a compression process, where wood fibers are bonded together, specifically for the use of backing or of reinforcing a veneer, and most often with a resin to keep it stable. On laminate flooring and engineered hardwood floors, the fiberboard core are sandwiched between the decor layer or veneer layer, and the backing layer. Take a look:
HDF is MDF are made in a similar process, although the compression levels are in a slightly lower range with MDF from 600-800 kg/m3. HDF is processed in a range from 600-1450 kg/M3. Fiberboard cores are checked for emissions levels, both when they’re manufactured, and afterward too before they’re shipped as product. This is mainly due to the use of resins and glue that are used to bind the materials, and the importance placed on reducing off-gassing as much as possible.
On the video, one of the pieces of advice is to always choose HDF when shopping for laminate floors, if you can. The ressistance to moisture, and to shrinkage and expansion in HDF is much higher. This makes for a more stable core, which is the job of the core in any case - to give you a more stable floor overall. MDF will still serve you, of course. But, HDF is preferable for better performance.
Last week, I talked a little bit about buying bamboo floors by color. In the second part of our buying bamboo series, here are some options to consider when you’re thinking about buying bamboo floors by cut.
Bamboo flooring is distinctive when you’re talking about natural patterning, in the same way that a hardwood floor is distinct from species to species in terms of grain patterns. Bamboo doesn’t feature grain patterns that you’d see in wood floors, but rather what are called ‘knuckle’ patterns, or ‘growth rings’.
These ‘knuckles’ are the result of the way bamboo grows, which is in short, irregular increments. When the bamboo plant is harvested, there are two main varieties of cut that show off these knuckle patterns in different ways. Here they are.
The first type of cut is horizontal bamboo floors. This style of cut is the result of a bamboo stalk being flattened and cut along its length, showing a wider patterning and a more pronounced knuckle pattern, which are the natural growth rings that make bamboo floors so distinctive. Here’s what a horizontal bamboo floor cut looks like:
Note the 'knuckle' pattern which is pronounced here on the horizontal style of bamboo floor.
The second style of cut is vertical bamboo floors, which is the result of the bamboo being cut and bound according to the thickness of the stalk, not the length. With vertical bamboo floors, you get a narrower, channeled pattern. The natural knuckle patterning is not as prominent, but it is still evident. Here’s what the vertical bamboo floor looks like:
You can still see the knuckle patterns of the bamboo stalk. But, it's the edges of the stalks bound together are what largely make up the look of this variety of cut.
Horizontal and vertical cuts are the two main options when looking for natural bamboo. And with both of these processes, there are a lot of parings left over after the stalks are cut. Luckily, innovation has led to a third variety of bamboo, which is strand-woven bamboo flooring.
Technically, this isn’t really a variety of cut, but is rather a bi-product of the cutting process. The parings of horizontal and vertical bamboo are bound together under extreme pressure and heat, creating a very hard style of bamboo that stands on its own; strand-woven bamboo. Take a look:
You'll notice that the knuckle patterns are still evident. But with strand-woven bamboo, you're getting a 'grain pattern' effect that is visually pretty close to the look of a hardwood.
With bamboo, cut method is vital to the overall look of the floor. When you’re shopping for bamboo, it makes sense to sample your options to determine which one best suits your taste, and your project too.
Next week, we’ll conclude our bamboo mini-series by talking about buying bamboo floors by surface treatment.
I overheard a very interesting conversation between two of our sales guys a few days ago. They were discussing a conversation one of them had with a customer about her hardwood flooring. She’d ordered a variety of handscraped hardwood flooring, and she was wondering how many imperfections she could expect to see in each board. The funny thing was, she was hoping for as many as possible! Our two guys had a laugh over how expectations of hardwood flooring has changed over the last few years.
A few years ago, consumers were after a pristine look in hardwood surfaces. Their ideal situation would have been in seeing no imperfections, as opposed to hoping for a lot. But, these days more of our customers are looking for a more contoured look in a wood floor, and handscraped hardwood is a very popular choice to get that effect. But, what is handscraped hardwood flooring?
Well, it is literally what you think it is. A worker at the wood floor factory has taken a hand tool, and has worked the surface of each board. This creates a series of broad, shallow grooves on the surface of the board that makes each one unique. When it’s installed, handscraped hardwood flooring boards add real depth to a flooring surface, particularly in the way that the light hits it at different times of the day. It’s a subtle effect, but a powerful one.
The effect is so popular, that even laminate flooring manufacturers have gotten on board. The process in making a ‘handscraped laminate floor’ is something of a misnomer. You can’t really scrape a laminate floor and get a good effect, since it’s not a real wood surface. But at the laminate factory, the board undergoes an extrusion process which creates the ‘handscraped’ effect. And this is what the laminate floor consumer is buying - the effect.
Bamboo handscraped floors, and engineered floors with handscraping are also popular choices. Handscraped wood floors tend to take in the best of both worlds when it comes to flooring. Visually speaking, you get a sort of clean orderliness with a wood floor. But, the handscraping adds a bit of visual variety to that orderliness. It’s the balance between the two that handscraping tends to deliver. And because each batch of handscraped wood flooring is unique, it’s a floor that you can call your own.
Bamboo flooring has really come into its own over the last number of years. This is partially due to the fact that bamboo has become the “poster floor” for green flooring building materials. But, that’s not the only reason they’ve come into their own as a floor covering of choice.
Because there are so many features to bamboo floors, it seemed high time that we talked about them here. So, this is a first in a mini-series about bamboo floors. And to kick things off a bit, I thought we’d start with one of the main features that makes bamboo flooring such a draw when it comes to modern design; color.
Color is an important element in the investment of any type of floor. And bamboo floors are no different, with distinctive color choices that provide an accent for surrounding decor, or be something of a feature to a space as well. But, what are the choices?
Bamboo flooring is known for its pale, creamy tones, sometimes ranging from a subtle off-white to a golden blonde color. This color range is known, very descriptively, as natural bamboo. Consumers choose natural color bamboo for a number of reasons, but one popular one is how it tends to bring natural brightness to a space. And because you can float or glue down a bamboo floor, it’s a great choice to bring a bit of sunshine into below-grade areas that don’t see a lot of natural light - like a basement suite, for instance.
Another choice in bamboo floor color is what is called ‘carbonized’ bamboo. This type of bamboo is known for a chocolaty-caramel tone, which is naturally derived when the bamboo is left to boil slightly longer than its natural equivalent. The sugars in the bamboo carbonize during this process, resulting in a naturally darker, and slightly softer, bamboo floor. A lot of consumers choose carbonized bamboo for its contrasting qualities in areas where furniture, walls, cabinets, and other interior elements are lighter.
One of the great innovations in recent years, apart from these natural varieties of bamboo floors, is stained bamboo and direct print bamboo. Direct print bamboo floors is an amazing choice if you want the benefits of bamboo and the look of hardwood. But, if you still wish to feature bamboo’s unique knuckle pattern, but wish to get a customized color (like a very dark ebony floor as shown below), then stained bamboo may be your best bet.
An overall benefit that bamboo extends to consumers is versatility, which comes out of how resilient and durable a material it actually is. As a result, you have a wide range of colors, cuts, and surface effects that make choosing bamboo floors an extension of your artistic vision, as well as your goals to invest in sustainable building materials.
As it’s been said on this blog many times, and can’t be said enough, is that laminate flooring has evolved since it was first invented. There have been many features that make laminate a practical choice in a flooring surface. For versatility and ease of installation alone, it’s been a go-to solution for many people for many years. Only recently though has it been thought of as an aesthetic choice as well as a practical one.
One such innovation in recent years has been the piano finish laminate floor. Take a look at this video featuring Co-Founder Rob Banks, who talks a little bit about this variety of laminate flooring. He’s got his salesman’s hat on in this video, just because it was a part of our product announcement series. But in it, you get to see how this line of laminate floors got its name. Take a look:
As Rob points out, the piano finish laminate floor is so named because of its high-gloss finish - not unlike that of a grand piano, one might say. At this point in the evolution of modern flooring, laminates are not simply measured by how practical they are, and how well they mimic a natural surface on a superficial level. It’s measured by artistry, too. This is one of the gaps that piano finish laminate floors seem to fill; a practical floor with a touch of class.
For the second year, we here at BuildDirect have gathered a group of ragtag, mustache-worthy misfits for this year’s Movember fundraising effort. All proceeds for our team’s efforts will be donated to Prostate Cancer Canada.
See the BuildDirect Movember Team page (’Eenie, Meenie, Miney, MOs’) to get a list of our participants, and to find out a little about their MOtivations are for getting involved.
Take a look at this video which explains what Movember is, and how this global effort raises awareness and funds for men’s health, specifically for prostate cancer research.
In addition to taking donations for the Movember charity, our guys have organized an event on November 26, here in Vancouver at the St. Regis Bar and Grill. You can learn about that event on our Facebook event page and you can also see some of the fabulous Mo’s from last year, including yours truly. I’m front and center sporting what the team dubbed the “dirty cop on the take” mustache.
Last year the BuildDirect Movember team raised over $800 and we’re hoping to crush that number this year. Please feel free to donate to the cause and come on out to the event if you are in Vancouver on Nov. 26
Here’s to the Mo’!
Another worthy charity event I’m supporting this year is the 2009 SEO Poker Tournament in Las Vegas, Nov . 12 at the Mirage.
Recently, we featured a miniseries about wood floor moldings, published every Friday for the last few weeks. Just by way of a recap, here’s BuildDirect Co-Founder Rob Banks talking about each molding we covered. Take a look!
As mentioned in other posts, wood floor moldings are the unsung heroes of an installation. No one is supposed to notice your moldings. But, were they not there, the whole look of a wood flooring installation would be changed, and changed for the worst.
It’s easy to think of a wood floor installation as a functional benefit, and easy just treat it like another chore to do around the house, maybe. Wood floor moldings reinforces the functionality of a quality wood floor, but they also add something else - artistry! And when you’re looking to get the effect of a floor that looks as though it’s always been a part of your home or office, quality wood floor moldings can help you to get there.
This is a treat, everyone. Here’s a guest post from Shannon Bilby, content manager for Creating Your Space, and chief blogger at fromthefloorsup.com, a blog I read and recommend. Shannon is a trusted voice in the flooring world, and we’re pleased to present her post right here. Thanks, Shannon!
Cheers!
Rob.
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With today’s economy and thoughts on the future, people are spending more and more time in their homes. With the uncertainty of the future of the economy, people are also staying in their current homes more often rather than moving to new homes. Because of this trend, changes are being made to their homes to make them more comfortable and livable.
Instead of going on trips to the spa, master baths are being transformed into personal retreats. Rather than just installing neutral floors, different tones, textures and patterns are creating more personalized spaces that make it more comfortable and appealing to spend time in.
By eating at home more often, improvements are being made to kitchens for more convenience and comfort. With the decrease in business traveling, master bedrooms and living rooms are being upgraded with more comfortable and durable flooring because more and more time is being spent at home.
The introduction of more linear shaped tiles is allowing for more creative designs to be implemented. Multiple shapes, sizes and textures are being used together for creating unique and personalized looks.
Due to more and more budget conscious spending and spending more time doing activities in their homes, laminate floors will continue to be a popular choice as an alternative to hardwood floors, tile and stone.
As green becomes more and more important and accessible while technology continues to make advancements in the flooring industry, I think we will see more green flooring products offered and used in homes.
I hope that glass tiles will continue to be used as accent tiles, wider and darker hardwoods will be used as well as carpets that have advanced and superior stain protection. It will be interesting to see if more color will be used throughout the home or if safer neutrals will be the choice.
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Shannon Bilby is a contributing writer and independent contractor for Creating Your Space (CYS) to the industry blog From the Floors Upwith over 15 years of flooring, design and construction related experience . Creating Your Space is a retail program that offers floor covering retailers a state of the art, cost effective, easy to execute website, social media packages and SEO to help connect with customers early in the buying process.You can follow CYS on Twitter @CYSWebsites and Shannon @sbilby. You can also become a fan of CYS on Facebook at www.facebook.com/creatingyourspace .
And so we’ve come to the last entry our miniseries about wood floor moldings. Watch for a recap post next week!
This episode is all about stairtread moldings, and here’s BuildDirect Co-Founder Rob Banks to explain the function, and to display the look, of stairtread moldings. Take a look:
When it comes to stairs, you’ve got a choice between stairnose moldings and stairtreads. The advantage of stairtreads is that you’re adding a complete stair covering that incorporates your choice of material (bamboo, hardwood, laminate) as well as the bullnosed edge that you’d get with the stairnose.
So, the extra cost is balanced out with the fact that you’re accomplishing both wood flooring effects at the same time; covering the whole stair, and getting that finished bullnosed edge at the edge of each stair. As Rob mentions, a lot of installers prefer this route because of the time savings.
As it has been well understood by now, wood floors are not just products you buy, they’re an investment in the look and feel of your home or place of business. This means that you’re going to want your money’s worth in the long term, not just a quick fix in the short.
This is particularly true when you’re dealing with engineered hardwood flooring, which is generally treated as a long-term and ideally lifetime floor covering. As such, reputable manufacturers are constantly testing their products, to make sure that they will stand up to wear over long periods of time, so much so that they put their products through processes that simulate common sources of wear.
One big one is moisture testing to make sure that the laminate layers that seal the surface of a wood floor don’t peel when exposed to rigorous moisture testing. Here’s BuildDirect Co-Founder Rob Banks in the factory, where some very specialized equipment is used to test engineered wood floors before they are shipped to distributors, sellers, and buyers of wood floor products. Take a look!
When you’re investing in the value and level of comfort of a space, it’s good to know that there are processes in place that test the products before you buy them.
