wooden floors- oiled or lacquered?

[nowwearefour]

we are going to get a lovely wooden floor for our new kitchen. oak. engineered as we ahve an aga. we have a gravel (fil calls it pea shingle) drive which comes effectively straight into the kitchen. we think we wont manage to maintain an oiled floor properly but am concerned about damage to lacquered floor from the stones (which do come in on bottom of shoes etc). so anyone had lacquered and regretted it? anyone had oiled and managed to maintain it annually? or not maintained an oiled floor and it actually be ok? or anyone with an aga and a solid wood floor that has coped?

We've got oiled solid oak floor in the bedrooms. I know bedrooms get much lighter wear than your kitchen, but I'd go for oiled finish if I were you.
Scratches & dents in laquered floor look awful, wheres scratches & dents on oiled floor look ok, and can even add to the character of the floor.

Oiling it is a doddle. Get a few old cloths, pour a bit of linseed oil onto a cloth and wipe the oil over the floor in the direction of the grain, then wipe off excess oil with another cloth.

We have solid oak flooring which is oiled in our hallway, kitchen and one sitting room. The boards have been down for two years now and have yet to sustain any damage.

DP has a client with lacquered solid oak and an aga. The surface still looks fine but the boards have shrunk dramatically.

I have oiled floors, because when we had them sanded we had a large dog who's claws would have had the lacquer up in no time. If you have an aga then I imagine you have two black labs to go with it?

Thanks for these comments. no dogs here! but v interested re oiled comments. also interested re shrunk boards. mmmmm. does look like engineered and oiled is prob the way forward!

We've had loads of problems with staining on our oiled engineered boards which we have in the kitchen. I suspect they weren't treated properly to begin with and/or the soap they sold us to "add protection" is actually washing off the oil finish. Has anyone else had problems, particularly with greasy marks which are impossible to remove?

(Sorry for the slight hi-jeck of the thread!)

HereThereAndEverywhere ~ Depending on how thick the oak in your engineered flooring is you might be able to gently sand and then re-oil the stained area.

So far we haven't had any staining at all which might be due to the oil we've used. We used natural coloured Danish oil from Rustins. In the two years our boards have been down we've oiled them four times. I mop them daily with Flash floor cleaner which doesn't seem to disturb the oil. I did try a cleaner designed for wooden floors but didn't like the dull residue it left.

We do sand and re-oil the stained areas but it leaves the floor patchy. Also it tends to not completely remove the stain which has permeated deeply into the board (I don't want to sand the whole thing away!)

It sounds like our floor was never oiled/"finished" properly for kitchen use.

I'd love one in our new kitchen when we move (so warm and inviting, esp. as there'll be a sitting area too!) but DH is dead against it after all the problems we've had with the state of the current one!

HTH helps the OP too! Take note of what can happen if it's not done properly!

OP if you are worried about the gravel damaging the floor (which is likely), you could put some large stone slabs infront of your front door, so you step onto stone rather than gravel before entering the house.

These could be set into your gravel quite easily and means your choice of flooring is not such an issue.

thanks for these comments. herethere- what does your dh want for kitchen flooring instead then?

I wouldn't put a wood floor in a kitchen unless you have a separate utility. I had beech installed throughout all downstairs many years ago, and took the kitchen floor up about ten years ago and replaced with tiles.

I have just replaced the rest of it with Khars oiled oak engineered oak. It looks fantastic, but I am not sure about the wearability at the moment. A couple of weeks after laying, noticed some stains in the hall. No idea what they were but they wouldn't come off, no mater what I tried. I googled it and found out the hydrogen peroxide might help. Applying it conservatively didn't make any difference, in the end I just poured it neat onto the stain and lefft for a couple of hours. It lifted it/

natural wood shrinks across its width (not its length) when it dries out. Engineered wood not so much, because it is just decorative plywood.

If there are noticeable gaps, it was probably not dried out correctly before being laid. Modern houses are very dry, especially in winter when the central heating is on. UFH would make the floor especially dry.