Prefinished Hardwood Flooring

Dover Flooring Blog

January 1st, 2015

Pre-finished Hardwood vs Site Finished Hardwood.....

This week we'll discuss some differences between a site finished hardwood floor and a pre-finished hardwood floor. In general we will be talking about solid 3/4" thick hardwood flooring. This can be of any species because the finish will generally be the same whether it's an oak floor or maple floor or any other species of hardwood.

Pre-finished hardwood flooring in most cases (not all) will have aluminum oxide injected into the finish. Why is that important? Well, aluminum oxide is the second hardest mineral. Only diamonds are harder than aluminum oxide. Putting aluminum oxide into the finish on a hard wood floor will make the finish extremely hard. It's so hard that it is also hard to sand down and refinish the hardwood floor at a later date! Now, ideally, with these new floors with aluminum oxide in the finish, you will not want to sand them down and refinish in the future. If your finish starts to look scratched and worn down (which will be a lot harder to do with these new wood floors) you will want to screen the top layer and apply a new finish. Sanding down through the finish won't be necessary in most cases if you catch it before you have wear through.

Aluminum Oxide is what they use in sand paper!

Aluminum oxide is added to the urethane in the finishing process and then the wood floors are UV cured. There is no harder finish out there at this time.

Site finished hardwood is the process of sanding down an unfinished hardwood floor, then applying a sealer and a couple coats (or more) of urethane. The urethane is what constitutes the wear layer on a wood floor. This process is the only way to spruce up an existing floor but not near the best way for a new hardwood floor. You don't have aluminum oxide infused into the urethane wear layer and it's not UV cured. You can use some of the best site finishes out there (such as Mega Traffic) but it still will fall far short of the hardness and wearability of a prefinished hardwood floor.

So, when buying a new hardwood floor, the best way to go is to buy and install a pre-finished hardwood floor that has aluminum oxide in the finish.

Dover Flooring Blog

August 23rd, 2015

Prefinished Hardwood Flooring vs Site Finished Hardwood Flooring

Which is better. Prefinished hardwood flooring or site finished hardwood flooring? Well, there are pros and cons to both.

Prefinished hardwood flooring is a wood floor that is finished at the factory. Unfinished hardwood, whether engineered or solid hard wood, will have a urethane finish applied at a finishing facility. This urethane wear layer will be infused with aluminum oxide and UV cured. This system produces a very hard finish that is resistant to scratching and gouging.  This type of system will provide the hardest surface for a residential hardwood flooring job.

A site finished hardwood floor will consist of an unfinished solid wood floor of any wood species installed. After installation of the unfinished wood floor, the floor will be sanded down and sealed. After sealing the floor, 2 or more coats of urethane will be applied to finish the floor. One advantage to this type of system is the floor itself will be totally sealed (at least at first it will be). This keeps water from getting between the boards which can cause damage. As time goes by and seasons with varying humidity levels pass, the wood floor itself will expand and contract causing cracks between the individual boards. Now the floor is no longer totally sealed from the top and probably negates the only advantage to this type of wood floor.

Another advantage of a prefinished hardwood flooring product is that the finish is already applied and dry so you can walk all over it once its installed. A site finished product will take days to completely cure and most people will have to stay out of their house during the finishing process. This can be very inconvenient.

Lastly, unlike in the past, prefinished hardwood flooring is more cost effective. It costs less to install a prefinished product than it does to install, sand down and finish an unfinished wood floor. So overall, I would almost always recommend a prefinished wood floor over a site finished wood floor.