Looking at underfloor wet heating system, and they all state, do not use solid timber floor as it blocks the heat, use laminated timber. I don't find this an appealing substitute, sounds echoing, can look very tacky after a few years, and looking at the on line market, very expensive. You can buy recycled maple flooring for £10/sq.m., but engineered is well over £20. How can that be?
Any suggestions about alternatives, cheaper and better quality laminated flooring, comments on finished on top of u/f heating?
Don't want noisey ceramic/tiling, do want soft on the eye and easy clean.

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: archess200. I don't find this an appealing substitute, sounds echoing

Are you sure you're not confusing laminated timber i.e. often birch ply with a 5 or 6mm wear layer, with "laminate". that is usually MDF with a wood look alike melamine paper laminate top layer, they can be noisy. There's no reason why proper laminated timber sounds any more "echoey" than solid wood. Otherwise what Beau says.

As Owlman points out, it sounds you could be confusing laminate with engineered. Laid approx 100sqm of engineered oak flooring about a year ago over UFH. No movement I can spot and everyone thinks it is a solid wood floor. To help give it that 'authentic' look, we mixed up the board widths, quarked the edges, selective removal of knots and had the boards 'smoked' - treated with ammonia - this darkens the wood which helps to achieve a very rich finish when applying a dark stain. It also penetrates the whole of the laminated real wood - 6mm in our case - so if you get a scratch, no problem.

we used 20 mm engineered oak on a UFH screed
we whitened the oak first and then a clear layer over the top
Very pleased withthe finish as it avoids a brown/orange look
Alternative may be slate, stone flags or red quarry tiles

Lee

We also opted for 21mm engineered oak flooring over UFH. Do shop around. I visited a few building shows and picked up samples of Engineered Oak flooring that looked ok. Back home in natural light some looked ok and some was positively horrible. One sample looked orange! Ours came ready coated with Osmo Hardwax oil but wasn't cheap. Visitors think it's a solid wood floor.

I have been told that that wood floor on joists must be >18mm thick for strength reasons. I believe this is why most flooring grade chipboard is 18 or 20mm. So we opted for 21mm thick Engineered oak. It would be a mistake to buy the cheaper 14mm Engineered wood and then find out you have to put 18mm chipboard down as well! That would total 32mm and might well be a problem for UFH.

Some sellers advise that you do not put rugs on top of engineered flooring and UFH. Apparently there is a risk of the floor delaminating. We haven't had any problems with that.

One advantage of using engineered oak is that you can use wider boards than you can with solid. If you put very wide solid boards over UFH there is a greater risk of them moving/cupping.

Edit: Our floor was T&G. It was glued together and secret nailed to the joists. I've read that it's very important to use enough glue and ensure the T&G is well coated. One web site recommended using a glue brush as apparently its too easy to run the glue pot along quickly and not use enough.

I laid 14mm engineered flooring over a concrete slab with underfloor heating and used a 3mm underlay that has supposedly good heat transfer properties.

The finished floor sounds much the same as in our previous house where I glued the flooring directly to the slab, good solid thunk and no hollow echoes.

We run the UFH with a flow temp of around 30ºC and have no problems with heat transfer. The heat transfer is marginally better in the hall which has tiles but it's no huge difference.

Screwfix used to do a double sided adhesive underlay which was very good for use with UFH can't find it know with a quick search but I might have missed it. I do see that they now have another 3mm underlay which has slots in it allowing you to partially glue down the flooring, it might be worth looking around for feedback on how in performs in practice.

Some people I know had a very expensive engineered wooden floor put down over their UFH, it went grey, they then had that replaced with one that was meant to be suitable for UFH, it went grey, got that changed and it went grey. They have a manky looking grey wooden floor now.

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: Ed Davies</cite>Have you told them about vacuum cleaners yet?</blockquote>
Spat my tea out at that one !

Earl Grey,or Darjeeling, Steamy? an' here's me thinking you were strictly Arabica.

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: archess200</cite>Thanks for response, all. Must admit not knowing the difference between laminated and engineered: definitely don't want ceramic or tiles, and definitely not lookalike: honest materials only please.
Leroy123: sounds good: anything to avoid the orange polyurethene finish. Have used acrylic finish on oak blocks, which has a great light finish, but lets in the wet from feet and drips. Can't get the blood out when Mr. got his hand caught in a circular saw. What clear layer did you put on? What make engineered, and where did you get it?</blockquote>

I ended up using an engineered board, very pleased, Kahrs activity floor, with a prefinished Oak surface! It can be sanded if damaged, I used it throughout the house with exception of bathroom and ensuite. £20m2 supply only, including underlay. I was worried that there would be low heat transfer through the timber, but it has been fine, actually I prefer it over the tiled bathroom floor, the underfloor heating is only on occasionally so majority of times no heating and the timber is warmer under foot. We have two hound kids and a dog, gets the odd scrape and bang but seems to stand up to abuse Ok.

And is handy to clean.......

Posted By: daserraPersonally, I think any wood (or carpet) over UFH seems counter productive. What about Karndean? Technically it's surely best to go with stone/terracotta/tiles/concrete.

http://www.karndean.com/en-gb/floors/guides-and-resources/guides/underfloor-heating-guide

"Karndean Designflooring is suitable for installing over under-floor heating systems, providing they have been insulated so that the surface temperature does not exceed 27°C "

I've no idea what they mean by "insulated" in this context.

We have a mixture of stone and engineered wood and carpet. Stone and wood seem fine, carpet needs care to keep the TOG down.

Posted By: ArchmocoI ended up using an engineered board, very pleased, Kahrs activity floor, with a prefinished Oak surface! It can be sanded if damaged, I used it throughout the house with exception of bathroom and ensuite. £20m2 supply only, including underlay.

Looks interesting. I'm curious where you got it, please? You can whisper the reply if you don't want it to be public.

Posted By: archess200You can buy recycled maple flooring for £10/sq.m.,

Ditto!