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One can shop at a number of home improvement stores in the US for engineered flooring. Lowes and Home Depot both carry several brands of engineered hardwood for flooring. One can also shop online at Build Direct, Simple Floors, and Can Floor for engineered flooring.
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What is the difference between hardwood and engineered wood floors?
Engineered wood floors are made of a plywood with a layer of solid wood on top. These floors allow wood to go where traditionally it could not like a cement sub floors or a sub grade level of your home. Engineered wood is sometimes called a remodel floor because it is more often thinner then solid hardwood. This allows a homeowner to more easily transition between floors that are close in height. They can be refinished, although depending on the thickness of the wood top, it may need to be professionally done. These floors are almost always prefinished. You will find engineered wood floors that are glue down, floating, and staple down. Another benefit of engineered wood is cost. Some more exotic species of wood are very expensive. Engineered woods allow manufactures ways to produce floors in a more budget friendly floor. Solid hardwood floors have time on their side. The tongue and grove style boards have been used in homes for generations. The live expectancy of the floor is 100 + years with proper care. They allow for much easier repair then a laminate or engineered wood and can be easily refinished my an informed DIY. In the past, you only saw solid would in floors 3/4" or even thicker. Today though, there are solid wood floors as thin as 3/8" which allow it to go into an area a ticker floor couldn't. You can find solid wood unfinished if you wish to stain it and polyurethane it yourself or prefinished for quicker installation. Engineered wood floors are made like plywood. They are made up of several layers, mostly of a less expensive wood. The top layer is made of hardwood. Solid hardwood floors, on the other hand are solid hardwood the entire thickness. An engineered wood floor may have only 1/16" or so of hardwood on the surface, where a solid wood floor might be a 1/2" or more. Engineered wood tends to be more stable - it is less likely to move or warp with changes in humidity or temperature. This is because the different layers of wood have the grain running in different directions. They are a good choice over a cement slab floor, and are frequently installed by being glued down.
Can you install hardwood flooring on vapor barrier on concrete slab?
Yes, if it is a floating hardwood floor. You can find them as click together or where the seams are glued. The downside is that often these floors are hard to repair unlike a solid wood floor. But if you want real wood and have concrete you do have options. Don't forget the foam padding required for all these floors.
What is Difference between hardwood floors and engineered floors?
Solid Wood: today most people consider solid logs cut to size and finished with a Tongue & a groove to be "Real wood" usually at least 3" wide & at least 3/8" thick. sizes bigger that 4" are called planks & thicknesses from 5/8" up to 1 1/4" are all common & readily available. Almost all solid wood floors require nailing to keep the wood in place ad they are still very susceptible to swelling in the wet & heat & shrinking apart in the cool & the dry. Engineered Wood: Looks like Plywood (it's NOT) with one side finished with a high quality species & a great factory applied finish and or stain. The engineered wood starts with anywhere from 3-10 layers of veneer glued together under very high heat & pressure. The top layer is usually the most premium of all the veneers & is often thicker than all the rest. The veneer, boards are referred to as engineered, since they are man made and built for a specific purpose, like flooring. Engineered wood is actually harder, stronger & much more stable than the same thickness of solid wood. It can also be glued down in areas where nailing is not possible like slab floors & basements. Engineered wood also resists swelling & bowing, because the layers are rotated in different directions as the boards are laid up before they are heated & pressed together. Environmentally the engineered wood uses less wood & the veneering process leaves almost no wasted wood and no sawdust. Once its on the floor even most experts cant tell the difference & the price is about the same for a good solid or a top of the line engineered. Save the money, the swelling & cracking and the forest & go with the engineered if you find a color or style that you like.
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What is a Pan Slab?
A pan slab is a elevated concrete slab that is formed with integral beams. The slab and beams are formed with either wood or pre-engineered forms, i.e.. PERI Forms. The Pans (forms) are supported by shoring jacks, either wooden or pre-engineered metal forms of various different manufacturers. For in-depth information, please refer to the DANSCO Web site. There you will find several methods of engineered Pan and shoring methods. Multi-story buildings are easily constructed using this method, please refer to spec section 03 31 00 Cast in Place Structural Concrete for further information on placing concrete, mix designs, and many other engineered requirements.
