Wood Flooring Exeter

Solid wood is one piece of timber from top to bottom. It can be sanded and refinished many times, which is why old oak floors can still look good after a century. It moves more as the air gets drier or damper, so it suits living rooms, dining rooms, hallways and bedrooms with a stable subfloor.

Engineered wood has a real wood top layer bonded to a stable core. It looks the same once it's down, but it moves far less, which makes it the better choice over underfloor heating, on concrete subfloors and in rooms where the temperature changes a lot, such as kitchen-diners and garden rooms. The thicker the top layer, the more times it can be sanded in the future.

On the visit we'll tell you which suits the room, and why, rather than steering you towards one.

Most of the floors we fit are oak, from narrow strip boards to wide planks, and from clean, even grades to rustic boards full of knots and character. We also fit other timbers, including maple and beech.

Boards come either factory finished or unfinished. A lacquered finish is the easiest to live with day to day. An oiled finish looks more natural and can be touched up in one spot if it gets scratched. If you want a particular shade, we can fit unfinished boards, then colour and oil them on site using Treatex and Saicos products, so the colour is made for your room rather than picked from a brochure.

Most problems with wood floors start underneath them: a subfloor that isn't flat, or one that's holding damp. On the visit we check for both. Concrete floors are moisture tested, uneven floors are levelled with F. Ball or Ardex compounds, and loose or creaking floorboards are fixed before anything goes down.

Depending on the subfloor and the board you choose, we'll float the floor over an underlay, glue it down or fix it to the joists, and explain the reason for the method we recommend.

Engineered wood works well in most kitchens and over most underfloor heating systems, as long as the board is rated for it and spills are wiped up rather than left to sit. Solid wood is usually best kept out of both. For a kitchen floor that will see a lot of water, our kitchen flooring page compares the options, and LVT flooring gives you a wood look that's fully waterproof.

Felt pads under furniture, a doormat at each outside door and a damp (not wet) mop will keep a new floor looking right for years. When a floor does start to look tired, it doesn't have to be replaced. Our floor sanding service takes solid and most engineered floors back to bare wood with a low-dust Bona FlexiSand machine and refinishes them. If you already have original floorboards under the carpet, that may be a better option than a new floor.

We're based at Shillingford Abbot, just outside Exeter, and fit wood floors across the city, from St Thomas and Alphington to Heavitree and Pinhoe, and out to Topsham, Exmouth, Cranbrook, Dawlish, Teignmouth, Newton Abbot, Torquay, the Teign Valley and Dartmoor.