Prefinished Hardwood

10 years ago

We are in the process of redoing our upstairs. We want to get rid of the carpet. We have red oak finished onsite hardwood and tile on our main floor.

We really don't want any carpet in the house, kids, dogs, etc. We have been looking at the prefinished for ease of all the furniture and clothes and not having to be out if the house for a week.

What is everyone's experience with Bruce from either Home Depot or Lowes. Also we went to Lumber Liquidators but didn't really like the salesman there. Are they any other choices that we should be looking at. We don't need any labor since we can do it ourselves.

Thanks. Melissa

Featured Answer

User

10 years ago

"Potential for seconds and lots of shorts at HD or LL."
"Can you back up your assertion with verifiable facts?"

I was referred to a friend of a friend who needed help installing a LL solid product. They were installing it over 1x2 p.t. screeds laid 12" on center and many of the boards barely spanned the space between the screeds. If you want to verify this you can fly to south Florida, we'll drive to the person's house and maybe you can talk him into letting you look at his floor. ;)

Prefinished Bruce products may or may not be seconds but they are likely not graded to NOFMA or NWFA specs so there's certainly the potential to have a lot of shorts. That's why I recommended purchasing a carton.
Like I wrote above, Bruce has a myriad of similar sounding products. I can't explain why.
Here's a list of solid 3/4" x 2-1/4" products available in Red Oak:
Bristol
Dover
Dundee
Fulton - regular & low gloss
Manchester
Waltham
Westchester
Add in Armstrong branded products:
Ascot
Somerset LG
Yorkshire
That gives you ten Armstrong products available to wood floor dealers that differ mainly in whether the ends and edges are square, eased, micro beveled or beveled. For a cash and carry customer I would price these anywhere from $5.80 to $7.25 a square foot. There may be other items they sell specifically to home stores that are either one of the items listed above relabeled, or are items specifically formulated for their customers.

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Comments (9)

Vertise
10 years ago
Skip your current selections.

I don't like prefinished but go to a flooring store for a wider selection of better quality flooring. Do your best to avoid having to redo it in the future. Lots of research, unfortunately.
melrsig
Original Author
10 years ago
No one at the flooring store can tell me what is the difference between their Bruce floor at 7.99 sq ft vs the Home Depot Bruce floor at 5.99 sq ft.

So any help here woukd be great. My brother has the Bruce floor in his house and other where his 2 150 dogs are most active on it I've said he has had no problems and it is probably at least 12 years old.

He and my husband did the installation on that as well.
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millworkman
10 years ago
Potential for seconds and lots of shorts at HD or LL. The material could even have been rejected from a real flooring store and end up on the shelf at one of these places. They are cheap for a reason!
User
10 years ago
Bruce (now owned by Armstrong) has a dizzying number of products, many of which seem to be nearly identical. They also likely make special products for home stores. My recommendation would be to purchase a carton of the wood and inspect it for quality, grading and how many short pieces there are.
In general the finish on most name brand products today is consistently decent.

A real wood floor person is going to recommend you buy unfinished wood and finish it on site but I think your situation lends itself to using a prefinished product assuming you're using a solid 3/4" thick wood that will be nailed down over your plywood subfloor upstairs.
UniqueWoodFloor
10 years ago
I would look into couple of online specialty wood floor stores. They could usually direct you a decent product at a reasonable price.
lazy_gardens
10 years ago
millworkman said, "Potential for seconds and lots of shorts at HD or LL. The material could even have been rejected from a real flooring store and end up on the shelf at one of these places.

Can you back up your assertion with verifiable facts?
millworkman
10 years ago
Nope that is what I have been told by more than one installer, even read on hear by flooring contractors and due to this fact I wrote "potential for".
Vertise
10 years ago
Lumber Liquidators seems to have a consistently terrible reputation. Lots of problems and flooring failures. I would be very cautious there.

The most expensive flooring you could buy would be the cheap ones. Not a project to skimp on. Do your homework. While you might not be able to afford the best, test the product first for durability.