Wood Flooring Thread

panthro

panthro

panthro

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Joined
19 Nov 2004
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Location
Wokingham
I cant decide whether or not to go with laminate or engineered wood flooring.
Obviously laminate is cheaper, but the quality and thickness of the board is less.
I live in a flat and will be laying either a 3mm or 5mm underlay (without damp proofing) to minimise noise.
Would thicker boards be better for noise insulation?
Most likely going to buy from Wickes as they have 25% off their whole range at the moment. I considered going to Jordans warehouse in London but it doesn't look that cheap.
Anyone got any suggestions please?
 
maccapacca said:
You may want to look at your deeds or lease, all the flats we build now have a 'no hard flooring' clause in the lease.
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Yup, very common so check before spending money. My old 60s flat had the same thing, only ground floor were allowed hard flooring.
 
Read through the lease, nothing in there. Plus all my neighbours have it.

Ended up going for 8mm laminate and 5mm underlay (no damp proofing as Im on the 4th floor).

My flat is pretty new and the sound proofing is excellent. Never hear my neighbours and I have my TV and surround sound pretty loud without complaints.
 
With the exception of my stairs, my entire house is laminate wooden floorboards. I have adjacent houses on 2 sides of my house and never caused issues with neighbours, even though I'm hard of hearing and not aware on how much noise I make. Can someone please explain the issue with floorboards? Do they conduct sound into the adjacent/connected dwellings worse than carpet does?
 
I was going for engineered wood, but this is stuff is surprisingly realistic and as I am only living here for around 1 year and moving on I didnt want to go overboard.
Definitely prefer real/engineered wood any day of the week.
 
I would have gone for the engineered regardless.

Laminate...drop something and will just go through the 'paper' photograph and look terrible (regardless of thickness) - real wood just looks better the older it gets.

Lasts a lifetime - no other floor needed

Come selling it will add value, laminate will not.

You can't beat the feel of real wood under foot, it will actually feel warm and not cold like the laminate.

Benefit of laminate - come to a time you may get water damage laminate will be cheaper to change, but that's what you have home insurance for :)

If I was you I'd go back and exchange mate. We bought our new build house 2 years ago...putting up with cheap carpets we put in whilst the house settles and we will be getting real wood.
 
I have neighbour below me who has tiling down on the floor, the poor guy below us is being driven nuts as are we, we have communicated with the owner most things have been ironed out except her two dogs, music, and when she opens her mouth... The block of flats is 14 floors and she is on the 8th, you can hear her dogs barking on the top and bottom floors as it echo's so much...

No one wants to make an official report because then you have to declare you have had neighbor problems when you resell.

I didn't realize, and I guess no one else has, that there could be a clause in the lease/deeds, so will look... the flats were so quiet when we moved in and now everyone I speak to is frustrated and angry.
 
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Interested in how this thread develops and links to some good online retailers. Moving house soon (fingers crossed- solicitors doing their bit at the moment...) and looking at wood flooring for downstairs.
 
Engineered wood, laminate is the tackiest crap out there. Along with magnolia paint and ikea furniture, it's ****. It will be the rag rolling and artex of this generation.

Real wood is the only way to go, if you can't afford it just get carpet.
 
I can't fault my Pergo laminate, stuffs top notch.

GinG said:
Laminate...drop something and will just go through the 'paper' photograph and look terrible (regardless of thickness) - real wood just looks better the older it gets.
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If you spend money on decent laminate this isn't the case.
 
panthro said:
I was going for engineered wood, but this is stuff is surprisingly realistic and as I am only living here for around 1 year and moving on I didnt want to go overboard.
Definitely prefer real/engineered wood any day of the week.
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Realistic.:eek: Engineered flooring usually the top layer has a 0.5-6mm layer of real wood veneer, not a photo realistic wood paper finish.

P:S: We still need our 'Home & Garden' sub forum.:rolleyes:
 
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panthro said:
Read through the lease, nothing in there. Plus all my neighbours have it.

Ended up going for 8mm laminate and 5mm underlay (no damp proofing as Im on the 4th floor).

My flat is pretty new and the sound proofing is excellent. Never hear my neighbours and I have my TV and surround sound pretty loud without complaints.
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There's a difference between impact sounds and airborne sounds. If you have a concrete flloor you'll probably hear very little airborne noise but impact sounds (footsteps) will bang right through.
 
Craig R said:
There's a difference between impact sounds and airborne sounds. If you have a concrete flloor you'll probably hear very little airborne noise but impact sounds (footsteps) will bang right through.
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A good acoustic underlay can help to reduce the impact and airborne noise transfer through floors.
 
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