How to Care for Engineered Hardwood Flooring
Maintaining engineered hardwood flooring is a painless process, as long as it is a part of your regular cleaning routine. To avoid potential damage, it’s important to keep your floors as free of dirt, debris and spills as possible. These simple tips on engineered hardwood care will help you retain the original look of your floor for many years to come.
Engineered hardwood flooring is made from wood. Because of this, it requires almost the same cleaning methods as any other type of wood flooring. Check out the steps below for taking excellent care of your engineered floors.
Engineered Wood Plank Care Tips & Techniques
Keep your engineered flooring swept, clean, and dry on a daily basis. This will keep mopping to a minimum and prevent abrasive particulates from scratching the surface.
Use either a vacuum cleaner with a soft flooring attachment, or a broom. A vacuum beater bar can cause scratches and damage to engineered hardwood. If you can’t get away from using a beater bar, make sure to set your vacuum to the bare floor setting.
Use a dry microfiber dust mop to pick up dirt and debris from the floor. Microfiber is perfect for gathering dirt and dust without the risk of surface damage.
Spills must be wiped up as soon as they occur. Excessive water or liquid can cause irreversible damage to engineered hardwood flooring. To avoid this, be sure not to mop up any pools of liquid and not let them sit. It is best to dry mop with a clean cloth when you fishing washing the floor.
Keep mats and rugs at entranceways. This will keep pebbles, dirt, moisture, grains of sand, fragments of glass, and debris out of the house and off of the floor. It will also help you avoid scratches, keeping the upper wear layer and finish of your floor safe and intact for a longer period of time.
Watch what shoes you wear indoors. Avoid walking on your floors with high heeled shoes or shoes with spikes because they can cause severe damage to the upper wear layer of the floor.
Avoid using harsh cleaners. Wax-based cleaners, powerful detergents, or steel wool should not be used to clean engineered hardwood flooring. For the best results, use manufacturer-recommended liquid cleaners.
Featuring Mazama Hardwood – Handscraped Tropical Collection in Maple Walnut  SKU: 10067144
Bettye Larner
Please tell me proper way to take care of new engineered flooring….some say Bona …….some say No to bona…thank you so much
Nancy
We bought a house with engineered wood but do not know how it was finished. I want to clean and polish it but don’t know what kind of product to use safely. I understand they’ve used bona cleaner in the past but I want something to add some shine and remove appearance of scratches and streaks. Thank you. Nancy
April s
I bought manufactured flooring from empire and every time I mop them they are dull and streaked, what can I use to clean them and have a shine to them ?
Joan Still
We bought a home with high gloss Brazilian cherry floors. Our daughter’s dog left wet muddy footprints on the floor. I have tried plain water, water & vinegar, water & a dash of detergent. They all left the floors dull and streaky. What works!!! Please give me an answer because we cannot afford to remove and replace half a bungalow of flooring.
Val
I bought engineered flooring for my kitchen – it was a mistake as I didn’t appreciate just how much food and drips get to the floor without being wiped up immediately – is it possible to apply a varnish or other protective coating before it becomes really bad? I know the spills need to be mopped up immediately but I’m not there all the time to make sure it gets done – probably water drips look the worst. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
BuildDirect Product Expert Team
Hi Val,
If your floor is prefinished there isn’t anything you can put on top without it just sitting on the surface and collecting dirt and dust. I usually suggest having a small rug in the areas where you get a lot of moisture like in front of the sink, fridge and stove. Please let us know if you have any other questions!
Michele Suttle
We installed acacia engineered hardwood in our kitchen. Yesterday, our daughter accidentally spilled hot bacon grease on the floor. Although she immediately cleaned the spill, it now has a creaking sound & does not “feel” solid under your feet when you walk on those boards. There is not visible damage to the boards. What should we do? And is this an indicator of what to expect in the future?
BuildDirect Product Expert Team
Hi Michele,
Sorry to hear about your floor. If the grease was cleaned right away it should not have affected how the floor feels under foot. It could have seeped through the seams a little bit. I don’t foresee this happening to the rest of the floor but I can never 100% guarantee. I would suggest getting an installer or contractor out to look at the area, it’s harder to tell without seeing it in person. Good luck!
Theresa Palm
We had our home built and closed on it 15 months ago. Unfortunately, the builder installed Mannington engineered floors. We are on concrete slab.
I have tried everything for cleaning as specifically recommended by Mannington from Simple green, vinegar/water, Mannington floor cleaner and Windex. Yes, Windex was recommended by Mannington.
This seems to be a common problem with engineered floors. They look ok for about 10 hours and soon after that, look like they need to be cleaned again. Extremely frustrating.
We have a no shoe home.
I have tried for 15 months to get into a satisfactory solution to keep the floors looking as clean as they really are, to no avail.
Had I known then what I know now, I NEVER would have had these pathetic floors installed, but rather have installed high quality vinyl plank. Unfortunately, oak wood floors are not an option on slab.
I would not recommend engineered wood floors under any circumstances. Save your 💰.
Theresa Palm
BuildDirect Product Expert Team
Hi Theresa,
I’m sorry to hear about your floor! The issue will have more to do with the type of finish on top rather than the type of product. I would suggest getting in touch with Mannington to find out what type of finish was used and the best cleaning method for that finish. Please let us know if you have any questions. Good luck with your floors!
Theresa
I did not like our engineered flooring but I used Bona floor care on it and it worked well
Elizabeth
I have engineered hardwood floor’s, for 14 years I use 1 gallon of water in 16 ounces of alcohol rubbing alcohol. I feel a small spray bottle on a flat looking mop. It drives so fast because of the alcohol and clean my floors beautifully.