Prefinished Hardwood Flooring – Many Different Color and Finish Selections
By Peter Leigh
Prefinished Hardwood Flooring has undergone many changes since hardwood flooring became the fashionable alternative for floors of a home. At one time, when you purchased hardwood, you bought the wood unfinished. This meant that when you installed it, you then had to stain the flooring and give it a protective coat and a shine. Today, you can still buy unfinished hardwood, but with the many types of prefinished wood, you can save yourself a lot of work by buying prefinished hardwood flooring.
Each prefinished hardwood flooring manufacturer has various color selections available along with different sizes of boards and finishes. The thickness of boards for prefinished wood floors can range from ¼ inch thick to ¾ inch thick. The top layer of the prefinished hardwood is the most important because it is the part that has to endure the wear and tear. The thicker the layer is, the more times you can refinish the wood floors in the future. The various widths you can choose from in prefinished wood flooring are a matter of personal taste. When you visit a flooring store, you can experiment by laying the boards of different widths of hardwood side by side to see what effect it would create.
The side edges of the Prefinished Hardwood Flooring boards are also an important factor to consider. You can choose micro bevel, also called eased edge, bevelled and square edged hardwood boards. Each one of these achieves a different effect in the prefinished wood flooring that you have. The types of finished for prefinished wood floors also vary according to manufacturer, but these are applied in a factory under ideal settings. Usually hardwood floors have seven coats of finish on them when you buy the packages of prefinished hardwood.
The newest finish on the market for prefinished hardwood flooring contains aluminum oxide, but there are also acrylic, urethane or UV cured among the finishes. There are also several levels of sheen – gloss, semi-gloss and mat. The number of coats on the prefinished wood floors will determine the level of shine that you have. Even though unfinished hardwood flooring is still popular, prefinished wood flooring makes up more than half of the sales for wood floors. This is because it allows people to remodel their homes with less time. All you have to do is install the flooring without having to worry about stains, coatings, fumes or drying time.
The ease of installation with prefinished hardwood floors makes them very popular with building contractors. Engineered wood flooring is also an increasingly popular item when people want the look of hardwood floors without the expensive price tag. These to come in different colors, but you will not get the same variety in the types of hardwood that you can have for your floors. When you choose prefinished hardwood floors, you can choose from many types of wood, each with its own advantages and unique qualities.
Prefinished Hardwood Flooring: Good And Bad
The idea of waxing and polishing one’s hardwood floors has pretty much disappeared from the homeowner’s memory. Realizing the user-friendliness is now a requirement for product success, hardwood flooring manufacturers have created advanced urethane flooring finished which can be applied at their factories and which dry under ultraviolet lights in a matter of minutes.
The Finishing Process
Because the finish is factory applied, it will be put on the flooring in a dust-free environment, and several thin coats are applied each being dried under ultraviolet lights before the next is added. Most Prefinished Hardwood Flooring has between six and ten coats of urethane, producing a highly wear resistant result.
While both Polyurethane and Acrylic urethane will produce a clear hard finish, the durability of prefinished hardwood flooring can be enhanced with the addition of either ceramic or aluminum oxide particles to the urethane; aluminum oxide is the favored additive because of the abrasion resistance it provides.
Finally, acrylic-impregnated prefinished wood flooring is strengthened by having acrylic injected into its fibers, and sealed with a urethane “wear layer.”
For those who are having homes built. Or a mew floor installed, the use of prefinished hardwood flooring eliminated the extra wait involved while their hardwood floors are sanded, stained, varnished, sanded again, and varnished again. Trying to put six to ten coats of varnish on and unfinished floor, and having to wait for each one to dry, would try the patience of Job himself–not to mention the fumes of sawdust and varnish permeating the entire house.
Prefinished hardwood floors are also low-maintenance. A weekly vacuuming with a soft brush, and a vacuum with rubber coated wheels, followed by a swipe with the cleaner/shiner recommended by the floor’s maker which you’ll be able to find at the retailer which sold you the flooring, is all that’s required.
Disadvantages of Prefinished hardwood Flooring
Prefinished wood flooring, however, is not without its drawbacks. One of them is that, in order to make allowances for any irregularities either in the sub-flooring or in the flooring itself, prefinished wood flooring is usually produced with beveled edging. While beveled edges are usually less conspicuous than square ones, they can be a hindrance during sweeping or mopping.
And the number of colors available in prefinished hardwood flooring is still rather limited, although the flooring manufacturers are doing their best to introduce new ones. But trying to custom match a new prefinished hardwood floor to the existing floors in your home may be very difficult.
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