Timber flooring......tell me all you know, please!!!!!!!!

ATM we have carpet and tiles. DH has wanted polished boards for years, but I have said no for various reasons. But I am SO over the carpet now, and would love to have timber floors. We have unfinished boards under the carpet, which DH has been keen to have stained and polished. I was okay with that idea, until talking to a flooring guy, just a casual conversation at work. Our boards are pine, which he said will be soft (which I'd kind of figured, and they can look kind of crap too), and will dent easily etc. He suggested that a floating floor over the top might be better.

SO, what do I need to know? I have very little clue about flooring, except I want it to look $hit hot LOL. Who has a floating floor? What do you like/hate about it? How much did it cost? Oh, and do you have it in your kitchen, or is that tiled? Um, anything else I should know?

TIA, so much :)

Hmmm - I have pine boards polished - and i love them! It would also cost heaps less to go this way. I have never dented my boards?!? You may need to look into the different types of top coat to protect the boards tho.

We have floating floors - you have to get the good quality ones (I think ours is made by Boral) with real timber. The cheap ones are, well cheap & apparently you can't get them wet 'cause the lamimate warps. It was faily easy to install - DH & Dad did it here & then Dad installed the same stuff in his house, but you have to leave a gap at the edge. Dad didn't in his and it expanded and lifted. Ours has scratched where DS has pushed chairs about, but it can be sanded back & re-coated once or twice. Ours is in the kitchen, dining & living rooms and we've had no problems (and lots of water spills). I'll ask DH how much it retails for.

I don't know the cost difference between polishing and floating floors. Sorry.

Mum has polished pine and there are lots of indented scratches where the cat chased the dog out of the house - dog wouldn't be able to get traction (it was funny to watch) and so damaged the floor, but I don't think there are too many scratches from other causes.

HTH.

Thanks girls! Okay, will definitely still look into the polishing option. I was thinking it might be nice to back out of this idea, since we'll have to move out :lol: but that's just very lazy of me. Will still get some quotes etc, and will look at top coat options.

I do know a couple of people who have installed their own floating floor, but by god that makes me nervous :lol:. I'm not sure if I'd be brave enough to go with that option, especially knowing how expensive the flooring is!! But we'll see, it might be the only feasible way to do a floating floor.

CF, so you're happy with the look of your boards? Did you get them stained as well? I have seen pine boards done, with different results. Some I've loved, and some I haven't. I guess I just want to be sure that it will look great, and that it's the best option for our house :).

When we built we had floating floors put throughout the whole house..not a square of carpet anywhere and tile only in the bathroom and laundry. We were told to be extra careful of a few things like water spillage should be cleaned immediately otherwise the boards will warp and look icky..this extends to not leaving windows open if we can't get to them immediately if it starts to rain, careful of vacuum cleaners to ensure the screws on the head are tight and don't scratch the floor..i've not had any issues with water damage in the kitchen however, we had one of those big puzzle mats on the floor in the lounge for ds and playgroup time and i didn't move it for a couple of weeks but when i did i was so upset to see the edges on a few lifted as somehow liquid had seeped through the mat into the boards..if we were to unclick the boards from the wall to replace the damaged ones i think we void our 25 year warrantee (as in order for the guarantee to be effective it had to be installed by the company).
However for scratches we have a "wax stick" which works a bit like crayon in colouring the floor back to it's original "jarrah"

bbl to finish my post!

We have pine boards right through the back of our house but only two rooms that are uncarpeted.

A few things I would seriously look into or consider:

1) they can be very cold in the winter. We have the master bedroom and a formal lounge in the boards and under feet in the winter its freezing.

2) make sure if you go with the original floor that you get a reputable person to stain and finish the floors. We use a different guy to MIL who did the lounge originally and there is a massive difference in the finish and quality. So much so that I will need to get the guy back to fix the other floor.

3) We have put cork or carpet things underneath the furnishings to help prevent dinting etc and it works really well.

4) I personally think a floating floor will add a little insulation to those rooms which you may want.

I love the look of timber floors, they are easy to clean but they do have some disadvantages unless you love rugs (which I don't).

hth

Nae x x

We rent but the owner removed most of the lino/carpet from the kitchen/living areas and did just what you described: stripped back to the pine boards and polished. We still have carpet in the bedrooms. Even though we are quite hard on our floors I'm glad they are boards. They hide so much wear and tear and dirt! Compared to the white tiles we had in our last town hosue they are MUCH better! Not as cold and not as noisey. It's nice to have a few large room size carpets over them too but the good thing with them is they don't get traffic wear marks because you can rotate them. These boards have gotten a bit dinted... but our owner is very casual about wear and tear. It really doesn'ty bother me. If we buy this house we'll put up with what is here until all 3 kids are in school and then renovate with nicer boards. When you have little kids I personally don't get too precious about things. I'd go the pine boards initially then maybe in a few years cover with the more expensive floating boards.

Thanks Nae, that's all helpful. The cold factor is one of the reasons I have resisted doing it. But I am desperate now, a toddler and carpet don't mix!!!! And I know it's only going to get worse around here :lol:. I had thought of the extra insulation that a floating floor would offer. And we will still be having carpet in the bedrooms, that is the one thing I will not budge on. I refuse to get out of bed and put my feet on a cold floor LOL!!!!! So it's the living area and the hallways, which is still a reasonable sized area to do. I am very reluctant to do the kitchen, and am still inclined to re-tile that area, and the laundry while we're at it.

Fortunately I love rugs, so that will help a bit if we go with the boards :). And yes, I am already looking around for someone really fantastic, as I already said, I want this floor to look awesome. So it needs to be someone who really knows what they're doing, I'm happy to pay extra for this.

Thanks so much guys, it all helps!!!!!

I wear slippers around the house pretty much all year round... the good thing about slippers is that you can wash them... constantly washing kid destroyed carpet is not as simple. We only have tiles in the bathrooms and laundry... I really dislike them in living areas... they make my legs ache (too hard)... and make everything so much noiser as sound isn't absorbed by them (tiles).

Thanks Bath! I wear slippers year round too, even with carpet :lol: (do you all think I'm a nana now??? LOL). I do get what you're saying about doing what works with little kids and then changing it later, but the reality is that if we spend a few thousand plus (?????just a ballpark figure) now, it will need to last us for probably 10 years. Unless we suddenly get rich LOL! So while I want what's practical, I'm trying to think medium term, and what will look really good. This will be a big feature, right from the minute you look in our front door, and I'm determined that it not look second rate. I really want it to improve the overall look of our (30 year old) house.

It is very hard making decisions like this! :lol:

I think either way, floating or just polished... you will probably have to have them resealed every 5 years anyhow. We have been here for 6 years and these boards should have already been redone. So there is that to consider. There are also lots of cute slippers on the market... Jiffies ballet flats are a non-nana option LOL

I think we have hardwood on our floors..

It is probably cheaper to do it yourself and it is very easy. a lot of work but easier then you think,. YOu just hire the floor sander then you polish it. there is more to it. you have to bang all the nails down before sanding then putty up any gaps.. Then sand.. Then polish. you can use any colour polish. We went semi dark and it came up a treat. It is 10 yrs old now and while it really needs re doing (still looks fine when clean though) We aren't doing anything till we renovate our house

Why don't you have a look at bamboo boards? I don't know much about them but a friend recently chose them for her renovation. They are very hard, so would be great for kids dropping things all the time. They just look like any other floating boards.

we have solid hardwood timber which is great and my brother has solid pine. Both have worn well....his floors are about ten years old and yes the floor does have some small dents because of rough kids but all timber can do that even ours has marks where furniture has scratched it a little bit. they key is in the finish....it HAS to be a two pack gloss finish if you want any sort of long term wearability.....stuff you do yourself is just not as hard if you get what I mean...a two pack finish cures to a rock hard seal on the floor unlike other readily available 'bunnings' style products....so definitely get a professional to seal it....it is well worth the extra money.

I also wouldnt give floating floors house room..even though the boards are sealed, the cracks in between are not and that is where you run into issues long term with floating floors..with a well sealed timber floor there are no unselaed bits for water to get in and damage your floor.

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Why don't you have a look at bamboo boards? I don't know much about them but a friend recently chose them for her renovation. They are very hard, so would be great for kids dropping things all the time. They just look like any other floating boards.

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just stumbled across this thread and thought i'd subscribe. i LOVE wooden floors...

We looked into getting bamboo when we first did our reno's and our house is small - 165m2 worth of bamboo floor boards was going to cost us around the $5,000 mark - not including instalation. We ended up tiling (ourselves - never again! - for $1,100

I sell floor coverings and I wouldn't recommend laminate floating floors. They're the cheaper option over the real timber but they also are a lot softer.
You do need to be careful with water damage (say your dishwasher/washing machine overflowed) The laminate is inexpensive but not necessarily long term.
I would suggest trying to use your own exisiting timber if possible :)
P.S Any other questions I'm happy to help.

We have floating floors over a concrete slab. I love them, so much warmer than tiles would be. DH put bits of felt over the bottom of all the furniture so it wouldn't scratch when it was moved. However we have been dragging the high chair (with wheels) across it and there are only a couple of little scratches there.

Ours has a gap all around the edges which has a timber skirting board over it to allow for the expansion of the boards, looks just like a standard skirting board.

We have it in the kitchen, family room and eating area. The family room has a big rug over it as well so there is somewhere a bit softer for DD to play on. The stuff in the kitchen has coped just fine with the extra bits of moisture that is dropped on it there.

My sister has some that are fairly new and she is still in the paranoid about scratches stage and only washes the floor monthly because she is worried about the moisture ruining them. I figure that something like a floating floor (rather than polished pine boards) is specifically designed to be used as flooring and if by walking across it with shoes on (rather than socks) scratches it then it was poor quality in the first place.

I'd recommed measuring the area you are looking at and going and talking to some flooring people. Have a look at the different ones you can get and find out how much they would be. Then call some floor polishing people and find out how much for that - might help make your minds up if you have an idea of the cost.

Also the nice thing about the floating floor is that it can go down in a day or two depending on the area - pollishing boards will be messy, smelly and have the areas out of actions for ages.

Also, our boards have coped so much better in the 6 years they have been down than the carpet has!!!

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The floating floor we've got is called Boral Silkwood and it retails for $70 to $150 a lineal metre depending on the style. (DH said he could supply, but I think the freight from Qld to Vic would add too much to the cost :p) If you google it there's a brochure which includes installation instructions.

It does insulate a bit, so that is an advantage over polishing the pine.

I think polished floors are much better than carpet too! :D In fact we're buying a house with all polished floors. I'm gonna get some rugs so my DH doesn't complain about it being cold in winter.

LOL SL, I'm struggling to imagine it getting too cold in your 'winter'!!!! Here in Melbourne it really does get cold, so we do have to take that into consideration.

Thank you everyone SO MUCH for your wise words and suggestions, it is really very helpful. I think we will talk to some different people, and get some ideas on what can be done, cost etc. After reading all of this I think I'm leaning again to polishing the existing boards. Mel, I definitely agree with you about getting a super good professional in to do it. There are many things I'm happy to do ourselves, but this is not one of them, it's too big a feature, too important. And doing it ourselves would mean it's unlikely to happen before this baby is born :rofl:. And that is one thing I'm set on, if we have to move out for a week etc, it HAS to happen before this baby joins us!

Still happy to hear other people's experiences, it's all helpful :)

It doesn't get "too cold" IMO, but DH whinges anyway!

Hi Janie, not sure where you are in melbourne but back 12 years ago I got my floorboards done by a guy. He was just a one man company and he did a great job and very down to earth. I am fairly sure he was Viking Floors and is in the yellow pages in balnarring.
ETA - a word of warning, even though they use a bag to catch the dust, there is still dust on everything. If you can, close and tape up the doors to the rooms taht are not being done otherwise you get a light coating of dust on everything!

We got a floating floor put in this time last year. We were going to get the floorboards polished but once the carpet was up & the guy looked at them he said there were way too many gaps & dodgy bits that would need fixing & it would have cost us more.

I'm quite a cold person, goes with a condition I have & to be honest I wouldn't say it was too much colder than the carpet. I did find myself wearing socks much more often though, but could go without no big deal.

Thanks ladies!!!!

Anney, we're eastern suburbs, so your Balnarring guy should be okay for us. I will look him up, thank you for the recommendation. And thanks for the tip about the dust, I will definitely do that! I am the queen of drop sheets when tradies come LOL, I hate cleaning up after them! So closing doors and taping etc sounds like a great idea. Out of interest, how long before you could come back into the house?

Sarah, thanks for that. I was worried about the condition of our boards too, but the bits we've been able to check out look good actually. The only bit I'm worried about is in our entrance hall where they will have to pull tiles up. I'm worried that lifting the grout etc will damage the boards. But as I said, I really have no clue about this stuff, so we'll talk to the flooring guys about it. My SIL had her boards done this year, and although they have beautiful timber, there were ALOT of gaps etc to fix up and IMO it's not that great a finish. I don't think I will use her guy. I want it to look really well sealed and polished if that makes sense?

Yep I know what you mean. You also might find some funny things when you pull everything up.... We discovered there was a doorway that no longer exists & some replaced boards near the back door, so had they been polished it would have just looked odd IYKWIM.

Yep, I think when they pulled up the lino/carpet here they discovered a few unused and covered up fire-place hearths... there's one right under my desk here... the wood is kinda patched but it doesn't stand out too much. If we renovate this house we might even re-instate the fireplace!

Janie, can't really remember how long before we got back in. I think it takes a day to prepare ie. block the cracks and bang in the nails and then a day (or maybe 2) to sand then they do 3 coats of laquer (i think) and each needs overnight at least to dry so it could be a week.
People next door have just been to europe for 4 weeks and I think they got theirs done in the first week they were away. so if you could afford a holiday and floorboards at the same time, that would be best.

Hey Janie

How exciting picking new flooring!

We put bamboo boards down in our house (which we just sold couple of months ago but still rent while we build). So much better getting timber flooring than having carpet, with messy little kids! Ours is super hard, but is glossy, so it's gets fine sratches all over it. Still happy with it though.

Look forward to hearing what you end up choosing! (and maybe seeing some pics! :D)

GL!

We are about the start renovations, and are putting down floating boards over a concrete slab. Now we just have to decide whether we should go the laminate or the better stuff. We are only going to be here for a few more years, so i don't know if it is worth paying double the price for the better stuff.

Does anyone have them in your kitchen? Aren't you supposed to avoid water getting on them? Is that a problem? OUr living rooms leads through an open doorway into the kitchen so it will look strange if i suddenly switch the tiles, but i don't want to kill the floorboards in 6 months.

Yael - ours is in the kitchen and we haven't had a problem after more than 5 years. We don't leave pools of water sitting around, but then I doubt many people would. If something gets spilled, we wipe it up.