Cork Flooring can surprise you!

(If I was wanting a new flooring that’s maybe sturdy,  gorgeous – would last and be easy to live with, well this might be it!. . . . . . . . . call it Spring fever, I dunno  Jan)

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Surprise! Cork flooring can take a beating

Q.: I’m very interested in cork flooring planks and wonder whether it’s really as good as the salesmen tell me.Because money is very tight, I’m looking for a discount cork floor. A carpet store in my town is having a cork flooring sale soon, so now’s the time to make a decision.

Do you have experience with this material? If so, would you install it again in a home you’d build? Is it as durable as they say? How do you protect it, and is it easy to clean?
A: I can understand your doubts about whether cork flooring is really a suitable material to walk on day in and day out. After all, when you hold a cork from a wine bottle in your hand, you can see it’s somewhat friable. Hold a piece of oak in your hands and try to break it apart or chip it, and your hands quickly wave a white flag.
I used to think the same way about this magical flooring material but was convinced shortly after seeing the first cork floor of my life.

About 35 years ago, my father-inlaw took me to visit a business partner of his named Carl Hunsicker. This man lived in a custom-built home that overlooked the Ohio River at the edge of a bluff. When we walked into Hunsicker’s kitchen, I looked down and saw the strangest floor.

He had cork kitchen flooring. It resembled the deck of a ship as the planks were very long and approximately 8 inches wide. It was dropdead gorgeous. When I asked what kept it from disintegrating as you walked on it, Hunsicker chuckled and said, “Son, you don’t have to ever worry about this floor wearing out.”

I later discovered that cork flooring was used in many commercial and institutional buildings that receive heavy foot traffic. The main library in Cincinnati had a cork floor for years that millions of people walked on. You don’t have to worry about durability if you purchase a highquality cork floor.

To give you another example of its extreme toughness: I installed cork plank flooring tiles on the steps that lead to my basement. Many people don’t realize that steps are the best place to test flooring, as your foot typically slides on the tread surface as you climb the steps. There’s much more friction than walking across a normal floor surface.
My basement steps got extremely heavy traffic because our home office was in several rooms downstairs. We also ran a cottage business shipping a cleaning product from the basement. Countless trips up and down the steps were made carrying boxes of products. To add to this misery, the steps were not vacuumed that often, so there was grit on them.

Just yesterday, I cleaned these steps, getting them ready for an open house. They looked like the day I installed them. I owe much of this to the toughness of the cork but also to the fact that I had originally coated the cork with five coats of high-quality urethane. I knew the steps would be abused, so I wanted plenty of urethane between the bottom of the shoes and the cork.

Another thing that helped the cork on my steps was the custom oak nosing I installed. Because I knew that shoes would be sliding onto each tread, I had the top piece of oak milled so that it was ¹/64 of an inch thicker than the thickness of the cork planks that were glued to the steps. This prevented shoes from wearing away the front edge of the cork on each tread.

I used clear water-based urethane to protect my cork on the steps and the cork that was on the floor in the entire basement. It was easy to apply and has allowed the cork to maintain its beauty for the past 10 years. Cleaning it is easy. I just use regular liquid dish soap and water to clean up spills.   For regular mopping, I add 8 ounces of white vinegar to 2 gallons of warm mop water.
Tim Carter is a columnist for Tribune Media Services. He can be reached via his Web site, www.askthebuilder.com.

TIM CARTER