I am considering prefinished wood flooring. The aluminum oxide finish concerns me. Aluminum in deodorants, in cookware is not healthy. As the floor finish wears, would the aluminium be released into the air and ingested?

The aluminum oxide is a very small mineral added to the polyurethane to increase abrasion resistance. As the floor finish wears, it is not released into the environmrent in a form of dust. Keep the floor clean by using a quality hardwood floor cleaner. The finishes today are healthier and more environmentally safe than they ever have been. When fully cured, they are inert.

All I can tell you is that we installed a prefinished aluminum=oxide uv cured solid oak strip flooring 3 months ago and we are having trouble with it. They stated it was cured and would not outgas but it is..sweet pungent smell. All tongue and groove nailed down but it is defintely the floors.

Could it be that this floor was manufactured in China? Quality control there has a ways to go before catching up with North America!

Could it be the asphalt impregnated felt paper your smelling?

Sally:
You are NOT smelling anything that has to do with the finish itself. Don't worry about the Aluminum oxide.
Charlie
Master Finisher

Charlie: are you sure the prefinished flooring cannot be smelling? I am quite sure that ours is. When I close off one room from rest of house and keep windows closed you can really smell it. We used rosin paper and have installed hardwood in 5 other houses so feel pretty comfortable that it is the floors. I just don't understand why prefinished aluminum oxide UV cured floors can smell at all. But nothing else has been done to the house, no paint, no new cabinets, furniture nothing.

KLARK:
I should elaborate.
There is absolutely nothing in the chemistry that would "gas-off" FROM THE FINISH itself. However, that's not to say that there's nothing off-gassing from the wood/glue/etc.!
I don't know all of the make-ups of modern laminates or engineered floorings, but remember when formaldehyde gassed off from the new carpets made in the 70's and 80's and maybe still do?? Well, there are those possibilities in the glue used to manufacture these modern engineered/laminates. Carpet fumes sometimes took weeks/months to get to an acceptable level.
Can you take a piece and do a "smell" test of it?
Cut a piece in half and sniff freshly cut edge. Then put your nose on the surface of the finish and see if there's a difference.
Maybe this will help you pin-point the problem.
Charlie

Charlie: We used a solid red oak prefinished flooring with aluminum oxide UV cured finish. I thought if it is solid red oak there would be no glues in it. It is not an engineered floor I know what that is. We were going to have a sander come in and sand the finish off on Wed. and recoat with a low tox water based product...we thought this would take the smell away. This is a huge problem for me because I have Lupus and get neurological problems from exposure to the flooring and stay sick for 3 hours after leaving house. Can the actually red oak make someone so sick what else could it be? thanks

One more quick question. The MSDS sheet on the coating and top sealer is filled with all kinds of chemicals listed with toxic effects, neurological effects, etc, none of that could be affecting me even at the so called cured state??? Or could we have gotten a bad batch in the bunch of boxes? We got them this year but they were dated for a year ago.

Some waterbornes can have some pretty nasty stuff in them. Make sure you get the safest one available. I don't know for sure but I think Bona Eon 70 is supossed to be very environmentally safe and have the lowest VOC's around. Check it out.

Klark:
Sorry! I went off on a tangent! Actually, then, I don't know what the problem could be. Where did the flooring come from? Can you smell it when you put your nose right down on the finish?
It's a head-scratcher.
Charlie

The flooring is from a local flooring store but manufactured by Zickgraf...red oak solid wood planks..it was not cheap and is good looking no problem with the install except hubby who has installed wood in all our homes lost his voice for 2 weks on this one and everytime he came near me after installation work I would react bad...There is an odor to the finish and the oak has a different odor..we ordered our finish thought NEEDS.

15 years later. We have the same issue. Did anyone figure out what was up with the floor? We have the same red oak flooring. Off gases a burnt wood smell. It’s in all our bedrooms. Not coming from vents. We are going to open up the ceiling on main level to see if any possible issues underneath sub floor. Not sure what else to do other than get it removed or potentially carpet over it?