Engineered wood flooring is now accepted as the preferred option for wood floors. There are numerous reasons for this but the main ones are listed below:
Stability: will not twist, warp and cup like solid wood or leave gaps in winter when the central heating is on and then expand (even pushing walls out) during a humid summer.

Quick and Easy installation: there is normally no need to acclimatise engineered flooring unlike solid wood unless you have underfloor heating
Sustainability: we can manufacture between 3 to 4 times more wood flooring from the same tree and use faster growing trees for the plywood like birch and eucalyptus. On our wider wood floors we use the cut waste to finger joint a middle layer and a back layer to create a stable very wide (340mm) engineered oak floor using 100% oak

How many times have you heard the saying “Never buy Cheap” you just end up buying problems, at the end of the day you always get what you pay for.
We have tried to explain below the difference between the quality engineered flooring we manufacture compared to the “cheap” options of wood flooring available in the retail market.

What is the difference between cheap imported wood floors and the more expensive engineered wood floors manufactured by professional companies such as The Solid Wood Flooring Company.

There is a plethora of cheap wood flooring which has been produced using inferior adhesives containing excessive formaldehyde and made without reference to European or British standards. This might not seem important and may not affect your floor in the short term but after even a few months you may have issues with the finish and the top layer.

There are two methods for producing the top layer and they are compared below

Cut Veneer: The hardwood wear layer is produced just like a solid oak board. The tree is normally air dried, and then cut into thick planks. These are kiln dried and then sawn into a 6mm or 8mm veneer which is what we call the wear layer on an engineered board. This layer is carefully machined to create a high quality veneer that is both smooth and consistent in its dimensions. This process produces a board that has the same feel and grain appearance of a solid board. By cutting into thick logs and kiln drying them and then cutting the veneer it means that the wear layer is calibrated to a consistent thickness which avoids thick spots in the board and in turn would mean that the board is not evenly pressed and could end up inconsistently bonded.

The veneer is then coated by machine to get a consistent covering with a pre-mixed Dynea Adhesive before laying on top of a quality approved pre cut piece of multilayer plywood. The plywood we use has a consistent thickness in each layer and is kiln dried to the same moisture level as the veneer.
These boards are then loaded into a cold hydraulic press at more than 5000 tons pressure per square metre to ensure that the adhesive penetrates the cell structure of the plywood board and solid oak veneer (the same method is used for our exotic, walnut and maple engineered flooring) and left to cure. Once this is completed the boards are “balanced in a kiln to ensure that the level of moisture in both the solid top layer and the plywood is the same before being processed in a profiling machine and finishing line and then packed in our cartons for total protection.

Sliced Veneer: This is where the log is soaked in hot water sometimes with a chemical added to soften the timber ready to be placed on a machine where it is sliced. The best way to describe this is to compare the tree to a roll of carpet. The large veneer slicing machine “peels” the veneer as the log is turned. This produces a lot less waste as it just peels each layer continuously from 3mm to 6mm thickness. This makes the oak a darker colour and also there is little heartwood in such veneers as they cannot slice near the centre of the tree. The veneer is also liable to splitting in later life especially when used over underfloor heating because they have altered the cell structure during slicing by expanding it with water which they need to do to be able to slice the log in the first place.
The comparison chart below shows the major differences and when you want a particular colour or finish you will only achieve it if we supply the wood and oils, we cannot be held responsible if you choose a different wood that has been made differently to try and achieve the same finish as we do on our wood it is not possible.

Construction • 6mm or 4mm solid oak top layer of European or Russian Oak on 14mm or Birch Ply • 1.5mm, 2mm 3mm or 4mm Chinese Oak on poplar core with poplar back layer or on 6mm Chinese Oak wear layer on mixed species plywood back layer
Bonding • Dynea pre mixed adhesive glued and cold pressed for the best bonding results. Every board is tested to check that it is properly bonded A sample of boards are laboratory tested each week to monitor how the bonding works in extreme conditions.
• Testing is undertaken and certified by independent professional companies • Quickly hot pressed with a wide variety of chemical adhesives, containing formaldehyde and other harmful toxins. The risk of delaminating is far higher with this type of pressing. Glues are heavily diluted and under applied to save money
Hardwoodlayer • The hardwood wear layer is produced as per a solid oak board. This means that it is airdried, kiln dried and then sawn into a 6mm wear layer.
• The process produces a board that has the same grain appearance of a solid board. It is also very important that the wear layer is calibrated to a consistent thickness as this avoids thick spots in the board and in turn means that the board is evenly pressed and also consistently bonded. • The hardwood layer is produced totally differently. Oak logs are soaked in hot water (sometimes with chemicals) to soften the timber. Once soft the logs are rotary sliced with a veneer knife into layers anything from 1.5mm to 6mm thick. This process turns the Oak a darker, grey colour.
• The rotary cutting procedure means that each board is taken from around the outside of the log. This produces a bland looking veneer. All of the wear layers look the same, none show the normal grain patterns that you would get in a hardwood layer sawn from a plank.

Back/Core layer •
• Birch or Eucalyptus Ply.
• 10 layers bonded together
• Each layer is made with a complete piece of veneer. Controlled veneer thickness all birch, not mixed species.
• Extra resistance and increased stability due to 10 layer construction of high quality plywood.
•
•
• We also use Eucalyptus for our plywood as it is faster growing than Birch and harder and we have 10 layers of cross ply. These trees come from managed forest so are certified to be sustainable. We source all our timber from sustainable forests
• •
• Poplar block board version:
• Poplar is a soft low tensile timber
• The block board construction is comprised of a thick section of the fast growing poplar tree that makes up the structural part of the board, bonded to a 1.5 or 2mm poplar veneer on the back of the veneer. This is the standard construction for a non-structural floating floor, but with a thicker core layer.
• Even though the board looks thicker it is not as strong as it looks. The core layer is just strips laid next to each other and unlike plywood construction offers no structural support. Far Eastern Plywood versions will contain different wood species which are bonded together to make a low cost plywood.
•
• The veneers are inaccurately cut so the thickness of the final sheet varies. All the veneers should be the same thickness to produce a stable plywood If you can see on the back of the board that the plywood has been heavily sanded, then it is unlikely to have been properly produced wood sourced from dubious locations with no documentation.
Length • 2200mm packs with one nested layer for widths over 189mm and for 150mm wide lengths of 1860mm • Usually random lengths with an average of 650mm or 1800mm long with nested layers
Thickness • 20mm • 10mm, 12mm, 14mm,18mm sometimes 20mm
Width • 150, 180, 189mm 220mm, 260mm and (340mm with Oak core) • 148mm/189mm sometimes 220mm
Machining • High tech moulded and quality checked using Homag profiling machines • Poor quality profiling with lipping between different boards on the surface.
• Difficult to fit tongues and grooves
Bowing • Well balanced moisture content of the wear layer and core layer.
• Each board is left to rest for a day after bonding to settle and then put on battens for circulation in a kiln to balance the moisture content of the solid top layer and plywood base
• • Excessive variations in the moisture content of the wear layer and core layer, even plywood will cause the boards to heavily bow, twist, cup and crown. There can also be problems in 6 months to 1 years time
Width variation • Precisely machined to +/- 0.25mm • Sold as +/- 1mm – i.e. can have 2mm gaps between boards and still be within manufacturers parameters
Wear layer • 6mm after sanding • Varies 1.3 to 3.5mm to 6mm

Drying • Air dried for 6 months
• Slowly Kiln dried 8-10% to British Standard BS8201 • Fast dried in veneer chamber in 45mins.
Finishing • Two coats of Timberex Heavy Duty UV Oil, or WOCA Master Oil or 9 coats Bona Industrial Naturale lacquer using base coats for added protection. These are applied on a professional finishing line with 10 stations (see our manufacturing facilities on the web site) where the lacquers and oils are cured using infra light to give the hardest finish available in the UK market • One coat of a petro chemically derived oil. Difficult to clean, attracts dirt that becomes ingrained. or cheap lacquers with aluminium oxide that can leave white mark when scratched. Heavy lacquer with poor scratch and impact resistance. Lacquer splits rather than folds into dents. Once the oak is not fully protected from dirt/water it turns black
Other treatments •
• Antique hand distressed (actually done by hand and not machine), fumed, double fumed, neutral lacquered, brushed, double brushed and oiled, French grey, weathered, and many more coloured finishes where we finish to your exact requirements. •
• Narrow range of options normally offered such as stains and lacquer with yellowing oak and machined distressing which has straight ripples and is normally too deep so it does not look natural.
Certification
• Professional and legal approach to documenting where timber comes from with far-reaching on sequences for organisations that flout the rules you can find us on the FSC web site as having a full chain of custody for all our sources of timber. • Widespread abuse of the certification system with over 300 FSC licenses revoked due to improper usage
• Check if the seller is claiming that it is from a sustainable source, and then check to see if they are registered with the FSC
Service and Availability • Our products are continually available, even with special finishing or grading requirements. If you buy a floor and need some more this will never be a problem • With 12 week delivery times and manufacturers closing down every day, continuity of supply is a major issue.
• Product specifications continually change and if no stock is available the wait can be long – even if you only need one pack!

There is a big misconception about wood floors finished with oils and hard wax oils. The main one is maintenance. In fact light oiled floors and dark oiled floors are easier to maintain and repair than lacquered floors with modern maintenance methods and kits. In high traffic areas oiled floors should be the preferred option for the following reason:

Places like stairs and corridors always get the wear in the middle and after a few months or year even a lacquered floor would look dull in the concentrated traffic area.

An oiled floor even one that is coloured can be made to look like new with a simple concentrated floor cleaner and a fresh application of the coloured oil, no sanding no mess just a simple process.

Lacquered floors are not easily repaired if people have high heels where the rubber sole has gone (just metal left) or walk in stones and sharp objects get dragged along. The normal remedy for this is expensive as it requires a full sanding and re-lacquer which is also time consuming with a lot of downtime.

The latest coloured oils and hard wax oils penetrate the cell structure of the wood therefore protecting it below the surface unlike lacquers that “sit” on top of the wood and therefore if the oak has been stained it can be easily damaged once the lacquer has worn away because the stain is not protected unlike coloured oiled floors where the colour is part of the protection.

Everyone has been in a public place like a bar, theatre, hotel school etc where the concentrated traffic area looks dull and dirty and if the floor was stained it also probably looks much lighter, and these are normally lacquered floors. With an oiled floor it would be very easy to rectify and repaired by simply reapplying oil.

The modern hard wax oils dry very quickly as the last thing a client wants is to install a high quality wood floor that gets damaged by workmen only to have to have it sanded back and re-finished.

Lacquered floors that are partly repaired never look the same because lacquer applied at a factory is completed on a specialist finishing line with heat, infrared and UV lamps to cure it so that it is a hard finish.
Oiled floors on the other hand can be done easily on site after fitting the boards when all other work is completed and are much more easily repaired to look like new.

If you get a bad or damaged patch in the middle of a coloured oiled floor you can renew it to look exactly like the rest of the floor, with a lacquered floor this is impossible.

Cleaning oiled floors is just the same as a lacquered floor, vacuum regularly, keep grit off it and use the correct maintenance kit: more details >>

The cleanest and most consistent white oak floor boards we supply are Russian white Oak cut from logs that are between 2 to 4 metres in diameter. To get the width of boards 220mm, 260mm and 340mm we select out the sap wood so you just have the inner part of the tree and the heart wood. Heart wood in such trees is more than 100 years old and will be denser in grain and also darker, this is natural. If you buy an A grade (no colour variation or knots or anything else you would only get about 5% to 7% of the tree which would mean very high costs in excess of £150 /m2 compared to the ABC grade which we normally supply which is still only about 25% of the tree. We use the rest in our rustic grade boards.

There are no solutions to the colour variation as it is nature and part of the grading, buy man made and you get dull artificial colour and texture like the horrible laminates.

To see some of this variation on a UV oiled go to this link more details:

To see variations on our 260mm wide board more details:

Should you require more information or help please call 01666 504015

Moisture content: The cold press method is not as easy to control, usually the best moisture content is 10-12% which results warping in dry places and where underfloor heating is used.

The Hot press method controls the moisture content at 8%-10%.

Our Strand Woven Bamboo flooring is customized for the UK market and underfloor heating to keep the boards more stable.

Structural Integrity:
Two edges of cold pressed strand woven bamboo flooring tend to collapse because of the cold press moulding shape. The pressure extered when it is manufactured (2000 tons without heating) means the two sides are lighter and do not have the same hardness as the middle.

Our hot press method which uses (4000 tons pressure of pressure whilst imparting 140 degrees centigrade temperatures) makes the pressure spread more evenly on the big board. We cut all the four sides of the board for other uses uses like small cutting boards etc (not flooring where we need integral and structural stability. This means we only use the centre part of the Strand Woven Bamboo for our flooring.

Below is the technical specification of our Strand Woven Bamboo compared to the majority of our competitors. The Formaldehyde and structural integrity is the most concerning when buying cheaper versions of Strand Woven Bamboo Flooring.

Density:
Cold press:0.97-1.07g/cm3 ,
Hot press 1.2g/cm3

Hardness:
Cold press:2500psi,
Hot press 2700psi.

Warping and twisting can invariably happen with Cold Pressed Strand Woven Bamboo whereas the Hot Pressed Bamboo flooring is much more stable

Size of Flooring:Cold press strand woven bamboo is normally 96mm wide , any cold pressed starnd woven bamboo over this width will have problems over time.

Hot pressed strand woven bamboo can be much wider. The board that is manufactured from the machine is 1860 x1400 x 35mm and can be cut into different sizes for width and thickness for flooring, large planks or panels for different uses in construction .e.g. structural beams ,butcher counter chopping boards, furniture boards, panels etc.

Colour variation:
Hot pressing bamboo means you get one colour for natural and one colour for carbonized. The colour is controlled by heating like the Anderson’s colour treatment method which is environmental friendly, not like some factories which use stains to make the same colour. Our Bamboo Flooring is done naturally within the manufacturing techniques.

Cold pressing bamboo gives a very large colour variation, at least three different colour shades which will give a lot of variation when the floor is fitted.

Visual Effects:
Cold press strand woven bamboo flooring does not avoid the glue lines when it is pressed and the strands are glued together.

With hot pressed strand woven bamboo these glue lines are never seen as the glues is dry when the strands are pressed together and the heat melts everything into one solid board. This gives a consistent great looking floor with little colour variation.

Green and Environmental Credentials:
Cold pressed Bamboo: Formaldehyde emission is 0.4mg/l even for the best one.
Hot pressed Bamboo: Formaldehyde emission is no more than 01-0.2mg/l .

It is because of the glue we apply which is more environmentally friendly than any used in the cold press method which means the formaldehyde in the glue is released very quickly when the boards are made in the hot pressed procedure.

Raw material sourcing and production management:
We have set up a fully environmentally managed bamboo plantation with an efficient production chain. We only manufacture form the best Bamboo which is immediately processed after harvesting which takes place on each plantation every 5 to 6 years and then we replant. Bamboo can grow up to 1 meter a day in its early stages and grows to over 60 feet tall in the space of 5 years. We then use Bona or Natural Oils to Finish our flooring to make it the most ecologically friendly in the UK market.

These are the reasons why you should buy our Strand Woven Bamboo rather than others.

Do not buy cheap Bamboo where they have made it from different species and harvested it too early. You will find that it is not as durable or as hard as the Bamboo Flooring we produce.

Air Drying
This is the traditional method of drying timber which occurs over a few years and is otherwise called Seasoning. This however will not normally reduce the moisture content below 15% depending on how it has been seasoned and the humidity levels at the time.

Kiln Drying
We need a moisture content of 8% to 10% for wood flooring in the UK not to move excessively once fitted, this is achieved by kiln drying which is like a big oven in which the temperature, humidity and movement of the hot air is controlled. This means that the wood flooring we produce is kiln dried to BS8201 if a floor is fitted in a very hot climate where humidity is low then it could reduce the moisture to 5% which means that you will get gaps appearing on the wood flooring. This can also happen if you have hot spots with underfloor heating.

AdhesionThis is where we bond one material such as a solid layer of oak on the top of a multilayer plywood board. The level of adhesion will be affected by the conditions of the surfaces of the timber to be coated with an adhesive, the closeness of the contact and temperature and humidity at the time. We control the environment where our engineered boards are made

Bevel Edge and Micro Bevel Edge
This is a feature in the manufacture of wood flooring whereby the sharp edge of the board is taken off and the bevel clearly defines the floor board edge (which can be more than 2mm) which can add to the ambience of the room it is installed in. The bevel edge is normally angled at 45 degrees. The micro bevel edge will be 0.5mm to 1mm so it is hardly visible but does leave a definition between each floor board once it is laid.

BleachingThis process is used to lighten timber and is normally a VOC free chemical. All natural wood will bleach with direct sunlight especially walnut and Maple.

Dark Brown OakThis is Oak that has a dark chocolate colour and has turned brown due to a fungal infection that causes a chemical change in the tree, this happens a lot in English Oak.

Parquet Wood BlocksThese are small pieces of timber in sizes that range 70mm x 250mm or 90mm x 350mm in varying thicknesses, our blocks are 8mm thick as we fix them direct to a plywood sub floor. The old traditional parquet blocks were 20mm to 22mm thick and fixed to a concrete floor using bitumen. The problem here is that they often lift and it is difficult to replace.

Floor Boards (planks and strips)This is the finished wood flooring which can be from 60mm to 200mm wide in solid boards and up to 340mm wide in engineered boards. Solid floor boards must never be floated as the will expand and contract too much.

Janka Test of Brinell Hardness Test
This is a hardness scale of different species of timber and the higher the number on the janka test the harder the wood flooring. Strand Woven Bamboo is one of the hardest flooring options available and is also the greenest option helping our environment.

Case Hardening
This is where wood has been kiln dried incorrectly. It can never happen with naturally seasoned timber. If timber is dried to quickly the surface shrinks very heavily which then compresses the interior of the tree which is still contains a lot of moisture. You can find that cheap wood flooring has been subjected to fast drying which means that when fitted the flooring is likely to split, warp and move excessively.

CelluloseCellulose is a long-chain polymeric polysaccharide carbohydrate, of beta-glucose . It forms the primary structural component of green plants. It forms the cell walls and framework for trees to grow and thrive.

CheckThis is a separation of the wood fibres lengthways which extends across the rings of annual growth. This usually results from stress within which occurs when wood seasoned.

Click System This is a method of joining floor boards together without using any adhesive. There are several patents and systems and it is where you need to put the boards together at and angle and then “click” them into place so that they stay together. This should not be used with solid boards and is normally associated with the cheap poplar softwood engineered boards.

Close PilingStacking of wet timber without sticks for air circulation (not kiln drying) which results in staining of the timber and serious losses due to fungal decay.

Coefficient of ExpansionAny natural product especially timber will expand and contract with changes in humidity and moisture. The rate of change will depend on the porosity of the wood and how well it has been dried. The rate of change will depend on the species of timber can can be measured by producing a table with test results. We have all these results in our technical specification document. The change in width can happen when moisture goes from 10% to 20%. For example Beech has a high coefficient whereas oak has a low one. Oak is a very stable wood floor especially and engineered wood floor and this link will explain more.

COSHH Health and safety is a very important issue these days and you can see more on our web site. We do not use VOC in our production and all our wood flooring is produced in accordance with the control of Substances Hazardous to Health.

Conditioning and Balancing
We use a special type of kiln to balance all the wood flooring we produce so that the moisture in the different layers is all the same to create an equilibrium in the flooring.

Cracks
This can be a small or wide gap in the timber normally caused by the wood shrinking or where we have a shake which is a defect in the board. Shakes as they are known can increase in size if the timber has not been kiln dried properly or if it is from an old tree that has not been processed properly. You can see obvious shakes in old green oak gate posts for example.

CrowningThis is where the floor boards distort towards the inner rings of the tree so that the surface becomes convex usually caused by humid or damp conditions on solid wood flooring.

CuppingSimilar to the above but where the boards distort and the surface become concave. This always happens if there is damp or moisture below the floor so that the bottom surface becomes saturated with moisture and expands and the top surface is still dry with a lower moisture content. Once cupping takes place it is unlikely that the board will flatten out again but there could be some movement in the future if the bottom dries out or the top surface takes in moisture.

Shrinkage Differential ProblemsWood flooring that come from different tree of the same species can shrink and expand at different rates due to the individuality of trees. The most stable floor boards are those that have been quarter sawn but this is wasteful in production so we now use engineered wood flooring.

Dimensional StabilityThis is what we call the movement of wood flooring. All wood will expand and contract and solid wood will move a lot more than engineered wood flooring. Movement is caused by the cell structure of the tree still being able to absorb moisture and expand and then in really dry or hot conditions (when central heating is on) to get rid of the moisture which means the flooring will then shrink. Installation of wood flooring will depend on whether it is engineered or solid and also what species it is.

Ends MatchedThis means that the tongue and groove on the boards match each other and are also on the ends of the boards. This means that the end of a board can straddle a joist with the tongue and groove on the end matching each other and a full board either side giving additional strength.

Engineered Wood FlooringThis is the most stable wood flooring and is made up of good quality multilayer cross grain plywood back with a 4mm, 5mm or 6mm top layer. The thicker the top layer the more expensive the wood floor as more wood is used. These engineered boards should not be confused with the cheaper laminate either where there is a thin top layer like 1mm or 2mm and a softwood middle or the really awful cheap plastic imitation flooring.

Fair and Average Moisture Content F.A.M.C
Moisture content can be measured very accurately these days but it will always vary across a batch of wooden flooring due to the fact that each tree is individual just like we are and therefore the cellulose structure will vary which therefore follows on that moisture will vary. This is why we state that the moisture content will be 8% to 10% and is well within industry standard tolerances.

Wooden Fibre Saturation Point
This is the point (theoretically) when the cell cavities of a trees cell structure are totally empty of water but the cell wall still remains saturated. The moisture level of such wood is 20% to 30%

Wood Flooring “Figure”The natural beauty of wood is brought out in wood flooring. There are many types of “Figure” as they are called such as the “birds eye” in Maple or medullary rays in Oak, you should always look at a manufacturers grading specification to see what you are likely to get when you purchase your wooden floor. Many displays only show the really good bits.

FSC Forestry Stewardship CouncilThis is a non profit organisation responsible for controlling ethically and managed sources of timber. Full details can be seen on their site and as we are members with a chain of custody certificate you can see our own policy by clicking on the FSC link on the top of the page in the scrolling pictures.

Grading of Wood Flooring
There are various grades on timber, some manufacturers describe them as “Prime”, “Rustic” “Select” etc. There is no EN standard or BS standard for grading wood flooring so you need to understand what you are being sold. Prime may mean no knots or sapwood but it could mean very small knots depending on how the manufacturer defines their grading. So please check what the grading includes or excludes. For example Prime Oak may not contain any sapwood or knots or pin knots (pin knots are the size of a pencil point), but Prime Walnut may have some sapwood and knots as a characteristic of Walnut is its grain and knot variations. Click here to see our grading standards across our range of products.

Green TimberThis is a term used for unseasoned wood and is never used indoors only outside for structures where movement is not an issue.

HydroscopicWood flooring is a hydroscopic material. This means that wood can attract water in and around its environment so that its moisture content increase when the air is humid and it will also lose this water when the air around it is hot and dry. Water will expand the wood and then when it dries out it will shrink, but either way it is never exactly the same which is why poor quality wood flooring can warp and twist.

Honeycomb of TimberThis happens with case hardened timber where the outer zones of the wood set and harden without shrinking leaving the inner core to die. This type of timber is structurally weak and will not withstand the load bearing requirements for buildings.

Wood KnotsThese occur as figures and sometime holes in the grain where once a branch grew out of the tree as it was maturing. In most cases these knots are very attractive and even where there is no actual knot the grain will swirl and vary due to the effect the branch had as it was being fed by the trees sapwood. Some tree have a lot of knots like walnut whereas others like birch have very few. We carefully grade our knots so that you know what you are getting (see grading above).

Laminate FlooringThis is a cheap plastic alternative and not only looks and feels cheap but is also a hydrocarbon product which means it is detrimental to our environment. It lacks warmth and resilience and we feel it is better to have a painted concrete floor than fit cheap laminate

Moisture ContentThis is the amount of moisture in the wood flooring which for our manufactured boards is 8% this means that any subfloor that you fit our boards to must have a moisture content of less than 8% otherwise the hydroscopic tendencies of wood will draw the moisture up and the wood will swell which could have serious consequences for your flooring.

Moisture Meters
These are used to test the moisture content of your floor and subfloor. These measure wood moisture equivalent as the moisture content of wood will be fairly consistent in the same board due to its fibrous nature however sand/cement screed, plaster on walls etc will vary considerably according to their particular composition. Consequently they are measured with the same meter that is used to check your floor.

Parquet Flooring
There is a lot of confusion about this term, in reality it means small pieces of solid wood 8mm to 22mm thick in sizes 70mm x 250mm up to 90mm x 350mm which is used to make traditional herringbone or chevrons patterns. We have our EAZY FIT Parquet flooring blocks with sizes that will allow you to make up any pattern and long pieces you can use as a border.

PEFCThis is a Pan European Forest Council whose task is like that of the FSC to ensure that all our flooring comes from sustainable sources and managed forests

PippyThese are where a lot of small pin knots form in a cluster it is similar to burrs on walnut and can be extremely attractive.

Plain SawnThis is the common way to cut logs these days rather than quarter sawn. It means we get a lot more wood flooring from a tree and the log is sawn into slices across the tree.

PlywoodThis consists of thin layers of wood about 1.5mm to 2mm thick bonded together under high pressure. Most of our engineered wood flooring uses birch slices with the grain of each layer going the opposite direction of the other so that the board is totally stable.

Quarter SawnThis is the old fashioned method of creating wood flooring. These boards are very stable as the tree is first cut into quarters (like a circle cut into 4 segments) and then each plank is cut from the quarter. Therefore these wood floor boards will not cup or warp like those that are plain sawn. Old galleons were made using this method and also Cathedrals and palaces and you can see the medullary rays (streaks) which are clearly visible running in swirls along the wood floor which looks fantastic.

Random Lengths
This is flooring where lengths can vary from 300mm to 1800mm on cheap flooring with an average length of 700mm. All our random length flooring starts with a 400mm long board and has an average length of more than 900mm

Random WidthsThis means that someone has used different width boards when installing a floor to give a more random effect. In the old days boards were cut as they came from the trees and laid accordingly which is why in very old buildings you see lots of different width boards.

Ripple
This occurs where sanding has not been done correctly.

Rippled
This mainly occurs in Maple and is really attractive and makes Maple a floor board to be prized.

Sap
This is the outer part of the tree that is very liquid and the cell structure is very open as it feeds the tree’s growth. It can bee seen as very light wood, on Walnut it looks white and in oak it is much lighter than the rest of the wood floor and is also softer as the cells have not matured.

Carbonising, Steaming and Thermo Treating
This is a variety of processes where the floor board is heated to high temperatures which turns it darker and also at the same time making it stronger and less susceptible to moisture.

Stick MarksFor air or kiln drying sticks are placed between the boards to allow air to circulate and sometimes these sticks can cause a mark in the wood normally when some form of chemical reaction takes place.

Sustainable Source
This means that the wood flooring comes from a sustainable source where the forests are managed properly and more tree planted than are cut down.

Tongue and GrooveThe groove is machined into the side of the wood floor board and the tongue is machined to exactly match the groove and protrudes from the edge of the board. The top of the tongue is normally 5mm to 6mm from the top surface or the floor board on a solid and engineered board, this means that you can sand a good quality engineered board as many times as a solid board. On good quality flooring the tolerance is important as if you want to float the floor you need as tight a fit as possible. In cheap flooring you will get very poor tolerances and therefore the boards will need to be filled with glue and the tongue and groove match will not give sufficient strength in the installation.

ShakeThis is a defect in wood due to the cell structure shrinking excessively leaving a crack. These can open even more if the board shrink further after installation.

ShrinkageThis happens when wood flooring dries out naturally or when it is being kiln dried, the moisture in the cell structure “fills” the cell like a balloon with air in it, when the wood is heated and dried the moisture disappears into the atmosphere. The moisture content of a tree recently cut down could be as much as 35% to 40% and when dried the timber will shrink more tangentially than radially. Shrinkage longitudinally very minimal due to the cell structure of the tree.

Spalted Wood or Brown OakSpalting or browning of timber is caused by fungi growing on the tree during its lifetime. If there are black lines this would have been the fungi dissolving the wood in order to feed itself from the nutrients in the tree. It affects the colour, hardness and strength of the wood flooring if it has not been selected out.

Wear LayerThis is the solid top layer of Oak, Maple, Walnut or other species of wood that is glued to a base plywood board. Wear layers on our wood flooring are between 4mm to 6mm thickness and our unfinished sanded to 120 grit which means, if fitted properly you do not need to sand before applying oil.

Trees take CO2 from the atmosphere, capture it and produce oxygen in return. Wood provides shelter, comfort and beauty in our homes, offices, schools and public places. It protects out boundaries, opens new horizons in print and safely carries our good around the globe.

For every tonne of CO2 a tree absorbs from the atmosphere nearly ¾ of a tonne of oxygen is produced*

Our forests are natural, highly efficient carbon sinks. Trees absorb and convert CO2 through photosynthesis into the nutrient sugars they rely upon and as a result of the process, oxygen is released.

Managed forests are the most efficient carbon sinks and producers of oxygen. The ongoing process of harvesting and replanting ensures there is always a healthy share of the forest made up of younger trees in vigorous growth. These absorb more CO2 than mature trees which left as they are in an unmanaged forest, eventually die and rot releasing carbon back into the atmosphere.

The CO2 absorbed by the tree during its life is trapped, or stored within the wood and remains so throughout the useful life of a wood product. The longer the life of that product the longer the CO2 is sequestered from the atmosphere. Repair, recycling and conversion to other types of wood based product can greatly extend the length of time carbon is stored.

Over 83% of the timber supplied in the UK is certified to be sustainable*

Of the remainder of timber not certified, the vast majority is well managed with due consideration to environmental and social issues. Certification and sustainable forest stewardship is growing incrementally around the globe: between 2005 and 2009 certification of all timber supplied in the UK grew by nearly 30%. The UK and Europe is most advanced in this process and over 98% of softwood used in Britain comes from here: its sustainability is evidenced by the growth of forest which is the equivalent to the area of Cyprus every year.

The industry which processes the harvested trees and ultimately manufactures wood products is extremely efficient. The UK and Europe’s sawn timber producers operate at, or very close to (average 97%), zero wastage of the wood extracted from the forest. Any material which cannot be used as solid wood is converted into wood chips for use in paper, particleboard, landscaping products or biomass fuel, which is often used by sawmills as an energy source.

Using wood instead of other building materials saves an average of 0.9 tonnes of CO2 per cubic metre.
A tonne of red brick for instance requires four times the amount of energy to produce than sawn timber, whilst concrete is five times less carbon efficient, steel 24 times and aluminium 126 times. By increasing the wood content of a building there is a proportional decrease in its carbon footprint. This is due to the extremely low energy consumption in the production of sawn timber and wood products in comparison with other building materials.

Factory production to the exact dimensions of timber frame structures contributes further to wood’s carbon advantage by dramatically cutting waste on site during the building process. In fact, it is possible to achieve CO2 reductions in the order of 88% on the build of a typical three bedroom detached house if softwood cladding is used in conjunction with a timber frame.

It costs around 5% less to build an energy efficient timber frame house or building*

Timber frame building has grown incrementally in the UK to an overall market share of around 25%. Lower build costs are a significant contributing factor to the increasing popularity of timber construction. Wood’s thermal insulation properties are 10 times better than brick and 5 times better than concrete. This adds up to a key cost advantage of timber construction in the achievement of reduced HLP (Heat Loss Parametre) when compared to masonry: the overall build cost savings range from 2.2% to 5.2% to achieve HLP compliances in the range of 1.3, 1.1 and 0.8.

Timber frame construction methods lead to a more efficient build process. Water tight within 5 days, a timber frame house is not subject to the traditional delay to other trades whilst the brickwork is finished. In comparison to wet construction methods there is little time lost due to drying out. Construction time on site is more predictable and 30% shorter with timber frame.

In its lifetime a uPVC window produces 1200% more CO2 than one made from wood*

Taking all material, production, transport and maintenance procedures into account wood is by far the least carbon intensive window material available. In production, uPVC’s oil base and the energy intensive smelting of aluminium contribute enormously to the carbon footprints of these materials. Wood’s exceptionally good natural insulating and cold-bridging properties are at least the equal of uPVC making it ideal in double and triple glazed applications.
Accelerated ageing tests simulating a range of environmental exposures have shown properly maintained, factory pre-coated units to have a life time in service similar to that of aluminium. uPVC units proved to be over 30% less durable. Uniquely, a wood window may also be economically repaired throughout its life. In these circumstances it is not uncommon for wood windows to last 100 years or so.

An ‘EUR’ wooden pallet stores around 29kg of CO2 taken from the atmosphere during the growth of the tree*

Pallets made from wood and wood derived packaging materials are the most carbon efficient option. Accounting for approximately 20% of European timber consumption these products are in most instances carbon neutral. Oil based PET, PVC and other plastics along with metals such as aluminium are significant net carbon contributors and remain so even once recycling is taken into account.

Heat treated wooden pallets have been shown by German researchers to be less susceptible to bacterial growth than those made of plastic. Wooden pallets conforming to ISPM 15 meet the most rigorous global hygiene standards and costs 50% less than the plastic alternative.
Once damaged a plastic pallet’s useful life is over. Wooden pallets are repairable, greatly extending their life and further reducing overall cost. When beyond service, wood pallets and packaging provide a substitute to fossil fuels if burnt as biomass to produce energy.

Change the materials you use not the climate. Thansk for reading this extract from the Timber Trade Federation of which we are members

Wood flooring

This is a disaster waiting to happen because the heat is trapped beneath the rug which will then create a “Hot Spot” under the rug. The consequences of this means that the temperature of the wood will increase and if any moisture or humidity is present the floor board will swell and expand and even “cup and twist. In an engineered board you will get the layers delaminating as shown in the picture below.

If you must have rugs make sure they are ones that will allow air circulation and not act as an insulator which is the case with most rugs and carpets.

Rugs and Carpets are normally made from wool or hydrocarbon compounds (oil) and as such are insulators. They should never be used with underfloor heating. Please call our technical team for more information on this on 01453 844675