The development of different types of parquet floors has been significant in recent years, whether it's HDF-based wooden parquet, water-resistant laminate parquet, or SPC vinyl parquet.
Modern parquet floors are reasonably priced, durable, pre-finished, and the average person can install them with little trouble. Most solutions are easily installable by a floating method by connecting the planks - no need for glue or additional fasteners. The complicated part is choosing the right product!
Characteristics of innovative moisture-resistant HDF-based wood parquets, water-resistant laminate parquets, and SPC parquets.
HDF-based wood parquets.
HDF-based wood parquets are glued to a moisture-resistant HDF layer with precious wood veneer, which is covered with a durable matte lacquer or oil wax. These parquets are many times more resistant to crushing and marks than ordinary wooden parquet and are significantly more moisture-resistant, making them suitable for installation in the hallway or kitchen. This parquet is not afraid of stiletto heels and heavy objects falling on it. The click connections are waxed, which on the one hand adds moisture resistance to the parquet and on the other hand reduces the possible creaking characteristic of wooden floors if the subfloor is not sufficiently flat. Thanks to the dense HDF construction, these parquets have better heat transfer and are very suitable in the presence of underfloor heating. One of the advantages of HDF-based parquets is also the stable large format of the product. HDF construction parquets can be purchased at a fairly reasonable m2 price. There are easy-to-install floating or glued to the subfloor 205-305mm wide floorboards or large-format herringbone parquets. You don't have to be afraid of the combination of large format floorboards and underfloor heating in this case.
Quick-Step water- and scratch-resistant laminate parquets.
With Quick-Step water-resistant and additional scratch-resistant laminate parquets, we are talking about very durable solutions because most of the known shortcomings of laminate parquets have been removed from these laminate parquets. The surface of the Quick-Step laminate parquet is completely waterproof and can be successfully installed in addition to the hallway and kitchen, also in the bathroom. ScratchGuard protection offers up to 10x better scratch protection compared to conventional laminate parquet. Thanks to the dense HDF construction, the laminate parquet has a low heat resistance and therefore the laminate parquet is very suitable for installation on underfloor heated floors. In terms of design, these Quick-Step laminate parquets are very truthful i.e., they have a natural wood or natural stone-like appearance. Quick-Step also offers a comprehensive solution for covering stairs with laminate parquet. It should be considered that the laminate parquet is a cold solution compared to wooden parquet or SPC parquet underfoot.
SPC floor coverings.
Parquet and laminate floors are not the only durable and easy-to-install solutions. We definitely recommend getting acquainted with SPC vinyl parquets. SPC floor coverings are extremely durable and very easy to install. SPC parquets are completely waterproof and can be successfully installed in bathrooms, even on top of old ceramic tiles. Since SPC parquets are relatively thin 4-6.5mm, this solution can be successfully installed on top of an old tiled floor or some other hard floor covering glued to the base without having to remove the old floor covering beforehand. The reason why SPC tolerates more unevenness of the subfloor and thanks to which SPC can be installed on top of old ceramic tiles and hard floor coverings glued to the subfloor is due to the rigid stone-plastic composite construction of the SPC, which does not bend so easily. This saves a considerable amount of time and costs for repairs. Another significant advantage of SPC vinyl parquet is that it can be installed by a floating method on a significantly larger surface. SPC can be installed without a deformation joint up to 20x20m (max 400m2). In the case of floor-to-ceiling windows, which can cause the surface temperature of the floor covering to rise above 27 °C in sunny weather, there is no expansion in size in the SPC floor covering and also no danger that the click connections would come apart. This kind of problem has unfortunately been observed in the case of floating installed LVT parquets. SPC is also resistant to marks and scratches. SPC has a very low heat resistance and therefore it is a very suitable material for underfloor heated floors. The SPC floor covering is naturally warm underfoot.