Hi, I'm looking for some suggestions in both species and manufacturer for our basement flooring that I'll be ordering in a few weeks (1700 sq ft, outside of St. Louis MO). I've looked at Armstrong American Scrape Engineered Hickory primarily as it has a few things we like.

We have two large 100+ lb dogs. The theory is that they've already scratched the upstairs Tigerwood just by being excited by the doorbell or a car door - so getting something handcraped saves us the trouble of leading them around to the pristine portions of the floor to even it out.

I personally do not like the extreme waviness of some handscraped floors, and this seemed to be one of the lesser wavy options.

I do like where it looks like the saw bound up, and there are extra cut / dings along the way.

My wife originally tracked down a birch product that looked nice, but was from Horizon Flooring, and wasn't a brand that it seemed like I could trust to be around next year. Seems like that's about the same for BuildDirect as well - in terms of carrying brands I can't find anything about.

I will be gluing the floor down with a urethane adhesive (probably the Bruce one they sell at the big box stores).

So with all that said, can any of you fine experts weigh in on either species or a manufacturer or brand to look at?

Thanks so much in advance,
Tom

That sounds like a good choice. Hickory is a very hard and durable wood, and the fact that the flooring comes "distressed" will forgive a lot of scratches, etc. The factory finished floors have an extremely hard protective layer, and it's nice to get the manufacturer's warranty as well. If doing a glue-down application over concrete, be sure to use Bostik's "Vapor Lock" adhesive, which acts as a moisture barrier. Good luck!

Slaughterbeck Floors, Inc.
Campbell, Ca.

I think you will like the handscraped hickory floors by Shaw. They really are done by hand, not a machine. Each piece is signed by the person who worked on it. It is made in the USA, and that is a plus. I am doing 2000 sq ft of glue down in my basement, using Taylor MS Plus adhesive. It also acts as a moisture barrier if you use the correct trowel. The Shaw floors look much better in person than they do on their website. Some have different gloss levels, so pay attention to that. The low gloss/matt finish on my floor has been really tough...harder to scratch than my site finished floor upstairs, and where I did scratch it, it touched up easily.

Thank you both for your feedback. We're picking up some additional samples on Friday, and hopefully will be purchasing it shortly thereafter. Still mudding currently!

If you have 2 100lb dogs I would look at a hand scraped hickory floor. Stay far and away from the birch with those dogs! I see a ton of nice looking birch floors out there just take your fingernail and see what you can do with them as I have found out that many are not created equal. Some will indent just by looking at them others are still pretty easy to indent with pressure but are serviceable for a not so active home with no pets. Most all your price point products have gone to birch just fyi.