Thread: Wooden Flooring

Originally Posted by Thaicoon

I have the same flooring in the bedrooms on the 2nd floor of my house, it may be from a differant supplier, but the joints are the same, mine is real wood, Burmese teak, and boy does it look good, been down for 7 years and still shines like glass, do not have a pic handy, when i get one i will post, it's as good now as it was wnen they laid it, no problems at all,

so how was yours laid Thaicoon? If laid direct on the concrete, maybe glued, do you get the same feel as a suspended wood floor? maybe just some 5x1cm strips before putting the planks down would work....

This is the wooden floor in the master bedroom, all bedrooms on the 2nd floor have the same floor, these were laid 7 years ago, and are still like new, mind you these are real teak.

^I have similar flooring, although not sure if it is Teak or a cheaper wood, but my TV isn't quite as big

nor my teddy

In my home in Australia, I got a floating floor laid.

There is only a small spacebetween the old tiled floor and the new wooden floor. The new boards were laid straight on the joists then sanded and polished and all the doors rehung.
It looks like it has always been there.

Originally Posted by DrAndy

nor my teddy

Did not have the wife at the time, she is back now, so the teddy came in handy tell i am welsh.

Eliminator, i bet your laughing, he knows what i mean,

if on a bad concrete floor one option might be to lay a 25mm slab of polystyrene first,
this will give the floor a softer feel and bed itself over any small imperfections.

Just a couple of observations from someone that has been in the hardwood flooring business for 30 years. Lamonate is a good choice for people that don't like the mess of sanding or the fumes of finishing. It is also a good choice for those that want a non-traditional color of stain on the floor, particularly white or white washed. At least in the U.S., many of the top quality manufactorers of laminate (stay away from Prego like the plaque) give a 25 year warranty on the finish. I've seen many a floor, including white washed, that looked like crap after 3-4 years, especially in the high traffic areas (mainly kitchens). I don't particularly like to promote laminates because they don't last the life of the house lilke solid 13/16 inch thick flooring. You may get one sanding out of it. Solid flooring, you get 4-5 sandings at least. If you are worried about scratches on the floor, use more than the 3 coats of finish that is recommended and top coat every two years or as necessary. Use a top quality floor finish, not just some crap that your contractor uses. Know how to take care of your floor. If you use laminate, find out what the manufactorer recommends to clean the floor and what they recommend to top coat the floor if and when it is necessary (and it will be eventually). If you clean the floor with wax or an oily product (like Murphy's oil soap in the U.S.), expect to continue to use it and then sand the floor bare to re-finish when necessary. The wax or oil will prevent any finish from adhering to the finish that you original used on the floor or the original laminate finish. Finally, if you are using the joist/screed method of installing flooring over concrete, use a layer of plastic sheeting first and then put 3/4 inch plywood down, nailed and then 15 pound felt paper and then the flooring (skip the felt if gluing down the flooring, obviously). I hope that this helps.

Maybe I'll stick with tile....

Actually, on the house that i'm having built, there will be teak floors upstairs (the old kind that are 6-12 inches wide boards at least one inch thick and nailed down. Downstairs, I was talked into tile, even though I had bought 1,300 square feet of rosewood flooring for glue down. I ended up shipping it to the states. I go back and forth about whether I made a mistake.

Originally Posted by Dean

Actually, on the house that i'm having built, there will be teak floors upstairs (the old kind that are 6-12 inches wide boards at least one inch thick and nailed down.

What's underneath? Just wooden joists, or what?

Laminate flooring looks cheep and tacky, always go with a wooden floor.

Under the teak floor upstairs are long teak beams held up by teak logs. Personally, in my business, I''ve seen three quarter inch wood floors put on top of joists and you tend to get a lot of spring in the floor and squeaks and seperation between the boards can occur. I try not to use 1/2 inch plywood subfloor because it still feels spongy and squeaks still occur. Hardwood flooring regulations in the U.S. suggest 3/4 inch plywood under the flooring and on top of the joists.

Originally Posted by Dean

Actually, on the house that i'm having built, there will be teak floors upstairs (the old kind that are 6-12 inches wide boards at least one inch thick and nailed down. Downstairs, I was talked into tile, even though I had bought 1,300 square feet of rosewood flooring for glue down. I ended up shipping it to the states. I go back and forth about whether I made a mistake.

OK Dean, you talk the laminate talk but you walk the real wood walk

All I did was give the positives of laminate flooring. I prefer solid 13/15 inch flooring that can be sanded many times and last the life of the house. The sad truth in the flooring business is that, when I started in 1976, almost all flooring installed was unfinished, 13/16 inche flooring (usually oak in the states). Now, about 60% of the flooring sold is pre-finished or laminates. Between the two, I prefer pre-finished solid flooring because it can be sanded and does last the life of the house (withstanding a fire or water damage). The grooves that are placed on the edge of pre-finished are so smal that they will usualy be sanded off after the first sanding (in the olden days, they called them "V" grooves because they looked like large V's and took at least 3 sandings to get them off. They catch dirt and look particularly bad in a kitchen, with all the food particles on the floor. If a sanded floor is maintained, with periodic top coating, they should look great for at least 10-15 years before re-sanding. Try to use a finish that doesn't yellow with age and expect a diniate outline around any area rungs, particularly thouse near windows that get a lot of sun (so don't move areas rugs around). The problem is; most floor companies don't top coat floors becasue they have no idea what the homeowner has used to maintain/clean the floor. If its a product that is not compatable with the orignial finish, there will be many problems with the top coated finish, including wrinkling or peeling. I will top coat floors of my customers because I drill into them how to take care of the floor and I have them sign a waiver of responsibility. I figure that 1 out of every ten floors that I have top coated have gone wrong. Thats why you should alway get the method of cleaning recommended from the manufactorer of the laminate (and ask what product they recommend for top coating when needed) and ask the same from the flooring professoinal that you hire to install new flooring or re-finish existing flooring. To be perfectly clear, my preference is still for unfinished flooring or solid pre-finished flooring. I can still count on one hand the number of times I have installed laminates in 30 years (I don't do much commercial work where it is used almosst exclusively). Fortunately, I've always been in the position of having customers wait for me, so I've always tried to give an honest opinion on the types of flooring (I've recommended tile or linoleum if I thought the customers would be better off with a different flooring even though I don't deal with either) and the type of finish. A small percentage of customers do listen to me and have their wood floors top coated periodically, which is also fine with me as I don't make much money from top coating (but I do feel an professional obligation to explain what they can reasonalbly expect from a wood floor and how to maintain it). Ocassionally, I've even turned down high priced work, usually involving white wasking a floor, becasue I knew the customer would be dissatisfied with the work in a year or two (even though I warned them) and I didn't need the headake of their complaning later on and bad mouthing me to all their friends. For 30 years, I did most of the installing, sanding and finishing on my own (with a little help from one or two people) and did take pride in the finished product. When I got into the business, I promised myself that I would get out of the business at the age of 40 if I were still doing most of the work. Unfortunately, I'm as critical of others work as I am of my own and continued to age 53 (present). Now, its time to allow my brother (not a hands on type of guy) and his two sons the opportunity to carry on the business. Physicaly, I could stilll do the work but the backackes were becoming more frequest and lifting heavy machinery up two or three flights of stairs was taking its toll. I know a lot of people think that floor re-finishing is a messy, dirty job (which it is, to an extent; newer machinery has better vacumns and dust collector bags) but I'll miss it. Hopefully, in Thailand, I can still get involved in exporting flooring/furniture to the States. I think that I'd go nuts being retired for the next 30 (hopefully) years.

You must be a good builder Dean, cos you sure make a good wall of words

Good builder, yes. Computer literate, just barely!

Originally Posted by Thetyim

I thought I would post this link as I have not seen this in Thailand before sorry if it is old news

Quick Step Laminate floor Thailand - Laminate flooring Thailand

So has anyone seen it or fitted it yet ?

And is it any good ?

The company listed,closed in 2006 but something called Forte Laminate Flooring is available from C.Plus, tel 02-645-0915
A better, wood, alternative (more expensive too) can be found here

Hardwood Flooring, Asian Floor, Thailand Flooring Manufacturer, Wood Surfaces, Solid Wood Flooring, Engineered Hardwood Flooring from Thailand, Laminated Floor, Thailand Exporter with ISO 9001:2000

^ quite nice, tried the earlier link from the OP, but it seems the company decided to leave Thailand rather going bankrupt here, a good move

Any timber experts know what 'cdub' means ?

I believe it is in relation to the circunference or diameter of a log at a certain height, I thought that height was 'breast' height....but whose breasts do they use....take my wifes for example...and then a ladyboys, 2 very different heights ?

Also any idea how many square meters of flooring you would get out of 23 cubic meters of logs ?

obviously it would all depend on the size of the logs abd how thin you cut them

for instance, we had 25 x 3m teak trunks, about 30cm at the widest

that cut to about 40 sq metres of flooring

Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog

My friends have used laminated bamboo. It's really good stuff. It's as tough as hardwood flooring, and it looks really nice. Also, termites don't eat it as it is grass not wood.

Bamboo flooring is becoming very popular, I'm not sure if it's eaten by termites or not, but if it isn't it's not because it's a grass. Termites will eat just about anything.

As a building material bamboo has a lot of advantages over timber, but durability isn't one of them. Besides termites, several other insects will attack it. New simple methods of preservation are being used to remove the sap, which what the insects eat.

[quote=buadhai;197917]Bamboo flooring is all the rage in the US now. Looks good. Lasts a long time. Made in Thailand or Philippines, I think....
Vietnam is a big player.