Sanding Kahrs & Boen Engineered Wood Floors

Hardwood flooring is always among the preferred choices discussed during property renovations. However, solid wood floors require a specialist floor fitter due to the nature of their installation and their sensitivity to various environmental conditions such as moisture.

Laminate flooring on the other hand, as much as it looks like actual wood flooring, simply is not real wood.

Engineered Wood Flooring Benefits

The intermediate solution in many cases comes down to engineered wood flooring. It combines the benefits of all other types of wood flooring - easy installation, damp and temperature resistance, easy to remove, as it's installed as floating and offers the beauty of the real wood.

The engineered wood has only one little downside and it is the thickness of its hardwood layer. This will define the life of the flooring, respectively - how many times it can be restored.

Engineered wood floors come in thicknesses of 14 mm, 15 mm, 18 mm and 20 plus mm. The first is usually accompanied by a top layer of 3 to 4 mm of real wood. The second offers usually a 6 mm top layer of real wood.

Now, one point to bear in mind for the thicker engineered floors is that these offer almost the same lifetime as all domestic grades prefinished solid wood floors. The third option comes with 18 mm thickness, which can be sanded up to a depth of 7 mm from the tongue & groove of the flooring. 

Why Kahrs and Boen Engineered Flooring?

Focus on the subject of this article is, however, the restoration of the thinner engineered floors and specifically, Kahrs and Boen engineered flooring, which seems to be a popular choice nowadays in the UK.

Kahrs engineered flooring comes with 15 mm thickness and offers a 3.5 mm top layer of maple, beech, ash, walnut and oak. Many of the options you will find from Kahrs flooring are colour finished - the main reason for the popularity of Kahrs product.

Boen, on the other hand, has included many flooring products in their range of 15 mm engineered flooring with a top layer thickness of 3 mm.

Even though there are some slight differences in the thickness and the finishes available from both suppliers, in the general case scenario the restoration of these types of flooring will be rounded to one!

There is the case, which may exist in a domestic environment where physical damage (e.g. high hill marks) of the top layer is not an issue and only wearing of the sealant is identified, where possible refinishing may be possible on two occasions.

However, if you are keen to approach with care your flooring, always use the same, well established professional floor sanding service each time. Make sure they keep a record of your wood floor sanding service details and some companies may produce such in the form of a certificate.

Be aware that if your floors have been originally finished in a colour-stained oak, for example, the colour may come this time different to a certain extent. Products used by Boen or Kahrs for finishing and staining the timber will not be the same as the ones used by your local company.

However, bear in mind professional floor sanding companies know how to achieve the best match for any colour provided.

The advantage of engineered flooring versus laminate is that engineered wood can be sanded after scratches and dings develop. Two catches, though:

• Limited Sanding - Because of the low tolerance for failure with sanding engineered wood, I seriously recommend that you have a professional do the sanding. It is very easy to gouge your engineered wood floor, revealing the plywood underneath.
• Professional Sanding Services is Recommend
• Engineered flooring cannot be sanded more than 2 times (depending on the thickness of the finish layer).