On Jan 25, 8:11*am, Ray K wrote:
In its August 2007 review of flooring, Consumer Reports said this about
solid wood flooring: "But ... all tend to dent."

In the rating table, they state that prefinished solid wood was "mostly
oak, typically nailed to a subfloor, and all were 3/4" thick."

Red oak has a Janka hardness rating of 1290; for white oak, it's 1360.
Hard maple, rated at 1450, is only about 9% higher than average of the
two oaks.

So why can bowling alleys, typically constructed of maple, withstand at
the approach end the extreme abuse of dropped 14-16-pound balls so well
while CR claims that all solid wood flooring tend to dent (even under
the relatively less severe conditions in a typical household)? Thickness
can't be the answer, because dents are surface phenomena. I can't
imaging thickness greater than 1/2" inch being any more dent-resistant.

As an aside, the report also said engineered wood "dents easily." This
makes some sense; if you put a thin hardwood veneer over a relatively
soft under layer (as an absurd example, balsa wood), the veneer won't
have any support.

I bought some bowling alley 'wood' on eBay from a chap in Indiana a
few days ago. It's about as far from the forest as anything I've seen.
It makes Pergo look like some kind of cardboard by comparison. The
stuff is a tough plastic laminate lithographed like maple on both
sides. The surfaces are an optical flat. As for as dents, there were
none. The material was used, and while one side had a high gloss
finish the other side was more like semi-gloss. The substrate was a
composite as hard as anything I've seen in a fabrication laminate. I
hope I can find some more of it to make a great big router table out
of.
I think that answers the question of why bowling balls don't get the
alleys all dented up these days. They sure did suffer, though, back
when I was a kid. HTH

Joe