A Plank Slate
So your neighbors have installed hardwood floors throughout their house--the kitchen, living room, family room, bedrooms, even the laundry room. Before you suspect that they’ve won the Lotto and haven’t told anyone, you may want to check those floors carefully.
Unless you have expertise in flooring, though, you may not realize that rather than a traditional, expensive hardwood floor, your neighbors have installed a laminate--a look-alike, feel-alike wood floor that doesn’t cost much more than a good one-piece vinyl floor.
Laminates, which began showing up in the U.S. from Europe about four years ago, have been about the biggest news in flooring since the invention of the broom. Some retailers have trouble keeping hot styles and brands in stock.
“They have 2% to 3% of the entire flooring market right now,” says Sunil Taneja, senior editor of Floor Covering News. “That’s
pretty amazing, considering they’ve only been around in this country since 1994.”
The appeal? Put a plank of laminate next to a plank of hardwood and you’d need a magnifying glass to tell the difference. Both have a distinct grain, slight imperfections and the same feel, experts say.
“At first glance, you can’t tell,” Taneja says. “If you’ve been around wood flooring, you’ll notice that laminates have more of a hollow sound when they’re walked on.”
The Layered Look
You may be familiar with the term “laminate,” and if you lived in a house built in the 1950s or ‘60s, you could probably recognize a laminated kitchen or bathroom counter top.
Made with thin layers of plastic molded over colored paper, the laminated counter was durable and easy to clean, as long as you didn’t use it as a cutting surface.
Slashes from knives, scratches from cleansers and dents from falling objects could irreparably damage the counter.
Over the years, laminate manufacturers have worked on such problems and developed a surface so durable that it can be laid on the floor and take the pounding of a houseful of Doc Martens.
A transparent polymer resin is used as a topcoat, and once it dries at the factory, it creates a rock-hard surface protectant. Below this layer is the visual surface, which can be two materials.
Plastic laminates have a highly compressed paper liner with a photographic image on top. This image can be of wood or granite, slate, brick or almost any surface. Wood laminate, also called “engineered wood” to differentiate it from plastic varieties, use a super-thin layer of actual wood, much like that used in wood veneer furniture.
Underneath the visual layer is compressed fiberboard, the backbone of the floor. Another protective coating is applied to the bottom to protect against rising moisture.
The Hard Facts
Genuine hardwood floors create instant homeyness and age gracefully. The downside? They’re expensive; they can be easily dented or scratched when used in high-traffic areas, and forget about using them in a bathroom. Pooling water or moisture can ruin the finish and cause the planks to buckle.
Laminate floors are generally better protected from water damage because of their tough polymer barrier coats. Still, you need to be careful about moisture problems.
“Water can be very damaging to most laminate flooring,” says Joel Spencer of Floors Unlimited in Orange. “There are newer-generation laminates that are better against moisture, but you still need to be aware of potential problems. It’s always better to install them in a powder room rather than a full bath to prevent a moisture problem in the first place.”
While hardwood floors start at $8 to $12 per square foot installed (a custom mahogany floor with walnut inlays can cost $30 to $50 per square foot), laminates are around $7 to $12--not much of a difference (a high-end vinyl floor could sell for as much as $35 per square yard).
Says Taneja: “The manufacturers of laminated flooring have really gone after the consumer who, until recently, would have installed carpeting or vinyl flooring. And they’ve been successful. They’ve got a product with excellent durability that’s very aesthetic.”
To choose between hardwood and laminate, evaluate how your house is used. If you want wood floors in a little-used living room, or your house is not occupied by any roller hockey players, and you can afford it, go with hardwood. This is especially true if you intend to live in the house for a while, because if properly maintained and periodically refinished, a hardwood floor can last a lifetime.
Laminates, on the other hand, are durable enough to withstand some heavy-duty marching and could last as long as your mortgage, which is good enough for most people.
There’s also the variety issue.
“The choices you get are unbelievable [with laminates], and that’s one of the reasons they’re so popular,” Spencer says.
When your laminate floor finally does end up with lots of scratches and gouges down the road, it can be refinished once because of the thinness of the veneer. Then it will have to be ripped up and hauled away, unlike a traditional hardwood floor, which can be refinished over and over.
Pergo, the company that brought laminates to the U.S., warranties its flooring for 15 years against wear, stains and fading. “You should get at least 30 years from a laminate,” Spencer says.
Although laminates are strong, they’re not unbreakable.
“Make sure that after you install your floor you also get a matching repair kit,” says Rich Zelle of Fullerton Paint & Flooring. “This includes an epoxy cement you use to seal up scratches.”
Getting It Down
One big advantage of laminates is that they can be installed over almost anything--concrete slab, wood subfloor, tile, vinyl or even an old wood floor.
Laminate planks are thin, one-quarter-inch thick, and they’re floated over the subfloor, meaning that the planks are glued together but they’re not attached to the subfloor.
Before installation, check to make sure the subfloor is level and correct any low spots with a filler such as Fix-All. A layer of plastic sheeting is generally laid across the subfloor as a protection against moisture. On top of the sheeting, a thin foam pad is applied to create a give to the new floor. The laminates typically come in planks, like traditional hardwood floors, but they can also be cut into squares depending on the floor design.
In addition to getting a repair kit, save the planks you don’t use in case of a major problem with the floor.
“If a dishwasher should develop a bad leak, or a water line breaks, you may get water under the floor, which is where you absolutely do not want it to go,” Zelle says. “If, after you’ve had some water damage, you notice that some areas of the floor are soft, that area is ruined and will need to be replaced.”
When you check out some of the laminated flooring displays at your local dealer or home center, notice that next to all of the related merchandise are pads for furniture legs, underscoring the point that laminates have their weaknesses.
“Remember that they’re scratch-resistant, not scratch-proof,” Taneja says. “You need to be just as careful about what you’ll be putting on top of them as you would with a hardwood floor.”
