At first look, bamboo flooring may be mistaken for an additional type of hardwood flooring. And it’s, in truth, typically grouped collectively beneath the overall class of “solid-hardwood” flooring. Bamboo and hardwood do have an analogous feel and appear, and each supplies can be found each in 3/4-inch-thick stable planks and in engineered variations wherein a finish-quality pure veneer is laminated over man-made core layers. However amid these similarities are some key variations that set these two flooring decisions aside.
Bamboo Is Not Wooden
Though it’s generally grouped with hardwood flooring, bamboo isn’t really a wooden, however quite a woody grass. Bamboo, a local plant to tropical areas with heavy rainfalls, grows a lot quicker than hardwood and has a unique mobile construction. You would possibly suppose this makes bamboo flooring impervious to water, however that is not the case. Unsealed bamboo may be discolored and broken by water, similar to hardwood.
Margot Cavin / The Spruce
Bamboo Is Generally More durable Than Hardwood
Simply because it carries the label “hardwood,” this doesn’t at all times point out {that a} wooden species is a really onerous materials. Technically, the time period really refers back to the wooden of any tree reproduced from angiosperm seeds—a type of seed that’s surrounded by some type of ovum, or fruit. This group consists of many well-liked species, resembling oak, maple, cherry, hickory, and walnut, amongst many others. The opposite foremost class of the tree is the softwoods, which develop from gymnosperm seeds—”bare” seeds that aren’t enclosed inside an ovum or fruit. This consists of most conifer timber with seed cones wherein the seeds are absolutely uncovered.
However when various kinds of woods are measured for his or her precise resilience to impression or scratching, hardwoods aren’t at all times more durable than all softwoods. Wooden is often measured by a take a look at often known as the Janka Hardness Take a look at. This entails urgent a metal ball into the wooden and measuring how deeply the ball dents the wooden. When measured by the Janka Hardness Take a look at, some hardwoods are softer than some softwoods, they usually might also be softer than bamboo.
Among the many frequent hardwoods woods used for flooring and woodworking, measured hardness rankings embrace:
- Purple walnut and Brazilian teak: 2,500 to three,500
- Onerous maple: 1,450
- Purple Oak: 1,220
- Cherry: 950
- Poplar: 540
- Aspen: 350
There are, nonetheless, some softwoods which can be more durable than some hardwoods; for instance, Japanese crimson cedar (900 hardness ranking), and Douglas fir (660 hardness ranking).
Usually, bamboo in its pure state carries a Janka hardness ranking of round 1,300 to 1,400, making it more durable than most oak flooring, and akin to onerous maple. Nevertheless, some bamboo flooring merchandise are carbonized to darken it. This course of entails inserting the bamboo beneath excessive warmth and strain, which causes the colour to alter but in addition considerably weakens the fabric. Carbonized bamboo carries a Janka Hardness ranking of round 1,000 to 1,100, which remains to be significantly more durable than some hardwoods.
Margot Cavin / The Spruce
Hardwood Provides Extra Range in Look
With hardwood, you will have many species to select from, and every has its personal distinctive look, really feel, and grain patterns. That is compounded by the truth that totally different cuts additionally produce totally different ranges of grain consistency. Lastly, hardwood flooring additionally is available in various grades, which is able to result in both good consistency via the lot (high-grade) or a variety of disparate items within the lot. Due to this, hardwood provides you extra freedom to decide on precisely the look that you really want. You may decide via quite a lot of species and choices to search out the look that completely matches the type of your surroundings.
Bamboo, alternatively, has a narrower vary of range. Probably the most distinctive look attribute of bamboo lies in its development, of which there are three sorts:
- Vertical-grain bamboo is created with slender strips of bamboo glued collectively on-edge, giving the fabric a striped look.
- Flat-grain bamboo is made with skinny, flat layers of bamboo glued collectively, much like the way in which plywood is constructed.
- Stranded bamboo is made up of bamboo fibers certain with resin; this has the variegated look of shredded materials.
The Spruce
Worth
Hardwood flooring prices roughly $4 to $8 per sq. foot for traditional supplies, resembling onerous maple or crimson oak, whereas extra uncommon hardwoods can value upwards of $10 per sq. foot. Bamboo flooring has a median value of about $3.80 per sq. foot, inside a variety of $2 to $6 per sq. foot. You may generally discover it for much less, however cheaper supplies are usually of notably decrease high quality.
The price of skilled set up is comparable for bamboo and hardwood, with prices starting from $2 to $12 per sq. foot, relying on labor prices in your space.
Environmental Comparability
Bamboo has gotten a variety of consideration for being an extremely inexperienced, eco-friendly constructing materials. It is because bamboo grass stalks can develop very quickly; some sorts attain full top in simply 3 to five years. Additional, when it’s harvested, the roots don’t should be reduce, so it might probably proceed rising with out the necessity for replanting. Bamboo is all-natural—it may be recycled and is biodegradable.
Nevertheless, there are additionally environmental drawbacks of bamboo. It’s usually grown in Southeast Asia and due to this fact requires vital power expenditure to get it to sure areas. It is usually more durable to fabricate bamboo into flooring than it’s to arrange wooden logs to be used, which suggests a better CO2 expenditure and environmental impression. And in some areas, planting industrial bamboo plantations have come on the expense of forests destroyed to make room for them. Many bamboo merchandise additionally make use of artifical chemical resins and glues that aren’t in any respect pleasant to the surroundings.
In comparison with bamboo, a hardwood tree can take upwards of 20 years or extra to succeed in full maturity and be prepared to reap, and harvesting means the loss of life of the tree. Thus, the supplies used take far longer to regenerate. However a single tree offers a considerable quantity of workable lumber. Additional, transportation prices are significantly much less for a lot of hardwoods, since they are often grown in a variety of regional climates and may be readily sourced from native mills. Lastly, stable hardwoods are a pure product, requiring no chemical resins or glues (engineered hardwood flooring, nonetheless, does embrace these chemical supplies).
Moisture Injury
Each bamboo and hardwood flooring may be ruined by moisture from standing water or water vapor. Bamboo is often touted as being barely extra moisture-resistant and mold-resistant, however research have proven that precautions have to be taken for moisture and dimensional stability in each bamboo and wooden alike. When you fail to correctly end both sort of flooring, it’ll discolor with each moisture and daylight publicity and will likely be extremely susceptible to stains.
If the surroundings is damp sufficient to assist mildew progress, each hardwood and bamboo are inclined if they’re unfinished. That is why neither hardwood nor bamboo is advisable for below-grade purposes, resembling basements.
High quality Management
As a result of there’s a lengthy historical past of use, hardwood flooring supplies are totally rated for measurement, form, moisture content material, evenness, consistency of shade, and sample options. Scores are offered by a number of long-standing unbiased organizations, most notably the Nationwide Oak Flooring Producers Affiliation (NOFMA), so you’ll be able to simply fee the relative high quality of any wooden flooring materials that you simply buy.
As a more moderen flooring product, bamboo isn’t presently rated in any official approach to assure the standard, supply, or consistency of the product. Subsequently, you by no means know fairly what you might be getting whenever you buy bamboo flooring. It is usually more durable to make sure that bamboo merchandise are sourced in a socially and environmentally accountable manner. The perfect strategy is to work with a good vendor or producer with a confirmed monitor file of sustainable practices or sources, and one identified for promoting high-quality merchandise.
Refinishing
Like stable hardwoods, bamboo flooring may be sanded and refinished when it turns into scratched or dented. The variety of instances you’ll be able to carry out this renewal depends upon the thickness of the planks, however bamboo flooring is mostly akin to stable hardwood in its longevity and has an extended lifespan than engineered hardwood flooring, which has solely a floor veneer of precise hardwood.
Backside Line
Bamboo flooring is undeniably stylish, and as such, it could lend some better actual property worth to your private home if you’re advertising it on the market. Bamboo is a really onerous and sturdy flooring materials; and it’s a genuinely “inexperienced” constructing materials, although not fairly to the diploma of its repute.
However for efficiency and longevity, hardwood is no less than pretty much as good as bamboo, and with dozens of species and grades out there, it provides a better vary of decisions for look.