we're putting in new floors in our downstairs (kitchen, hall, living room, family room, dining room), and we keep flip flopping over what is more important.
this is our primary home that we plan to stay in (not a flip property), and we have a dog and kids (male) - so i want good quality and durability.
1) is an oil finished floor as damage resistant as an aluminum oxide finish?
2) how important is the janka score?
3) is solid 3/4" really less stable than the multi layer plywood?
4) anyone have recs for manufacturers/brands of prefinished floor with an oil finish (rather than aluminum oxide)
5) anyone have thoughts on BR111 floors or Wood Cellar floors?

I really like the Wood Cellar Relica Legacy Walnut floor - seems to have a good wear layer, and i love the oil finish. and it's slightly distressed which i assume will mask the wear & tear a bit. HOWEVER, the wood is so soft - i was jumping around on the sample in heels and it left indentations - yikes! (This did not happen on the brazilian cherry aluminum oxide finish - i know the cherry is harder than the american walnut - but what made the floor more dent resistant the wood hardness or the finish). Online I saw some of the exotics from BR111 - and they look great (the brazilian walnut, rosewood, havanna cherry - very attractive and super hard woods too)...but they're aluminum oxide finish which to me seems a little too shiny.

I'd appreciate any input. It's so difficult to imagine what four rooms will look like in a new floor from just a 2'x2' sample!

thanks so much!

Maybe consider doing an unfinished engineered. This way you can use the finish of your choosing and maybe even extra coats for extra protection. Some good brands of unfinished engineered are; real wood floors, and uptown. We have used both several times and were really happy with the results. If you want to use a prefinished, then BR-111 is a great product, I am not familiar with the other one.

Unfinished engineered hardwood Uptown floors

My local prosource has recently upgraded it's wood flooring section and included quite a few oiled and hard wax oiled floors. They repair quite easily as compared to an AO finish. And you can buy pre-sanded engineered and put on Rubio Monocoat yourself pretty easily with just a quick screening and vacuum to get off any contaminates during installation.

One thing about some engineered is that you want to look for a nice wear layer , least a 3mm top on it, beware of the thinner ones.

PM me and I'll tell you more about Prosource and how to buy from them.