Expert Flooring LLC knows that aggressive sanding and refinishing are best suited for solid hardwood floors—flooring comprised of solid maple, oak, or other hardwood throughout the thickness of the planks. Hardwood floors with 3/4-inch -thick planks can accept three or sometimes even four deep sandings over their lifespan.

But many floors are not solid hardwood, but instead, consist of planks with a hardwood veneer layer glued over a core of plywood or another manufactured wood product. These products are often known as engineered wood. With these floors, you may be able to do only one sanding, and you need to be careful not to grind through the finish layer of hardwood and into the core layer.

Some floors that look like hardwood aren’t wood at all. If you have laminate wood-look floors, sanding is not an option. However, bamboo floors (bamboo is technically a grass, not a wood) can be sanded in the same way as hardwood to remove surface imperfections. But bamboo floors are often very hard, so sanding may take a little more time.

Engineered wood flooring looks very much like solid hardwood, but its construction features a relatively thin layer of hardwood bonded over a premium-quality plywood layer that gives the flooring very good stability. A good-quality engineered wood floor typically lasts 25 to 30 years, and it is both less expensive and quicker to install.