{draw:frame}
Real hardwood Oak flooring
{draw:frame}
Laminate wood Oak flooring
Hardwood versus laminate, this is a common decision that homeowners face on a regular basiswhen choosing which type of flooring to have installed in their homes today. Although laminate flooring has a layer of real wood on the surface, there are areas of the home where real wood will definitely have the edge.
Laminate and real wood flooring are available in a variety of wood grain, color and species. Most real wood flooring is ¾ inches thick and will come in widths ranging from 1 ¼ inches wide to 5 inches wide, and in an even greater abundance of lengths, ranging from 12 inches to 16 feet long. Laminate flooring is typically 3/8 inch to ½ inch thick and the most common products come in 6 inch widths, made to look like two 3 inch boards, and48 inch lengths. Real wood is just that, boards sawn and finished from trees, no additives and no fillers. Laminate flooring is a thin layer of real wood, approximately 1/8 inch thick, glued to a base material composed of wood particles or some type of plywood. Real wood flooring can be either prefinished or finished after installation is completed. It can also be refinished many times throughout the course of it lifetime. Laminate flooring comes only in prefinished form and typically can only be sanded and refinished one time after being installed, however this is not something that is recommended by tradesmen, due to the difficulty of sanding the old finish off. If real wood should become wet, or sustain some water damage, it can be sanded and refinished to look almost new. With laminate flooring, after getting wet, this type of flooring needs to be dried within thirty to sixty minutes or the glue will start to break down and the flooring will swell,or worse yet, it will delaminate, making it impossible to refinish. When it comes to price, after you purchase all of the needed accessories for the laminate and pay for the installation...