High heels and hardwood

[Veronica 1]

Well, not hardwood but laminate flooring. I am worried about my heels denting the surface. They are normal 3" pumps and the contact area is about 3/8 (10mm) square and I weigh around 160 pounds.

[Deanna2]

My wife doesn't like my pointy heels on carpet either.

[Tamara Croft]

I think laminate flooring is a bit more durable than we think ;) I have it in my lounge and dining area, and it's fine :) Just don't go dropping (translated to throwing in temper lol) your DIY tools on it... they do tend to leave a nice dent ;)

[Shannen]

I'm sure you could do some damage if you are not careful. I'm thinking if a heel "tip" came off and the nail that holds it on is left exposed... definite damage! I've seen this happen to my wifes shoes, never happened to me yet.

You would tend to hope that any manufacturer of flooring would "test" this possibility... I wonder if their warranty covers damage due to high heels?

-Shannen

[Babette]

Well, not hardwood but laminate flooring. I am worried about my heels denting the surface. They are normal 3" pumps and the contact area is about 3/8 (10mm) square and I weigh around 160 pounds.

I put laminate flooring in a few years ago. During the process of deciding which brand to use, I considered the manufacturers' warranty periods. They ranged from 10 to 30 years.

I went with the 30 warranty and found out how hard the flooring really was during the installation. After trimming the end pieces for one bedroom, I had completely dulled a new carbide saw blade. Since then, I have never found a single scratch or dent. This laminate is many times harder than real wood.

I have seen lesser quality materials in other buildings and noticed scratches and chips. The saying "You get what you pay for" probably applies to this situation.

My bottom line: I have no fear of walking on my floor with high heels.

Hope this helps.

Babette

[Emilia]

You're more likely to make scuff marks than do damage, Especially with laminate. Just don't jump off a chair in them!

[_Sarah_]

I'm a sucker for old fashioned properties so i would just polish up the wood as opposed to putting laminate down.

[Cristi]

I have soft pine flooring in a few rooms of my house and I can attest that heels are a BAD thing on them. :(

They have to be sanded and refinished someday soon, and I'll be looking for a harder urethane that can withstand the pressure.

Until then, I don't put on the heels until I get out of the house.

[MentalMercury]

Area = 3/8 inch * 2 (since you have two feet/heels) = 6/8inch squared
Weight = 160lbs
Pressure = weight / area = 160 lbs / (6/8inch) = 213.3 pounds / square inch (psi)

That's standing still, not if you jumped. Try asking someone who worked on your floor to see what pressure in psi the wood can take.

But here's what I came up with, and there could be mistakes..

I punched that info into an equation I found on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_modulus), assuming that the floor is made of pine, and assuming it's about 4 inches thick, it will compress 0.009 inches (~228 micrometers) due to the pressure of the heels. That is about the length of a dust mite according to this wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(length)). Oak is stronger, and that's without taking the added strength due to lamination into account, and also the fact that most but not all of the pressure is concentrated on the heel tips.

Your floor should be safe if you don't scrap the heel against the finish.

Doing that was actually fun

edit: haha or I could look one post up and see that I guess it's a bad idea after all. Shows what I know! Though it makes sense, if it were furniture that applied as much pressure, it'd be fine, but heels would probably make scrapes unless you were really careful walking.

[erickka]

Roll vinyl flooring is the pits with spiky heels. Leaves marks or dents all over the place. Ceramic or porcelain tiles are best, and your heels get that real nice click when you walk on them!

[Katrina]

I haven't had a problem with pre-finished red oak flooring. That was something I was concerned with at first. I have some scratches, but I think those are from the dog scrambling around to get to the food.

[VirginiaX23]

Area = 3/8 inch * 2 (since you have two feet/heels) = 6/8inch squared
Weight = 160lbs
Pressure = weight / area = 160 lbs / (6/8inch) = 213.3 pounds / square inch (psi)

That's standing still, not if you jumped. Try asking someone who worked on your floor to see what pressure in psi the wood can take.

But here's what I came up with, and there could be mistakes..

I punched that info into an equation I found on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_modulus), assuming that the floor is made of pine, and assuming it's about 4 inches thick, it will compress 0.009 inches (~228 micrometers) due to the pressure of the heels. That is about the length of a dust mite according to this wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(length)). Oak is stronger, and that's without taking the added strength due to lamination into account, and also the fact that most but not all of the pressure is concentrated on the heel tips.

Your floor should be safe if you don't scrap the heel against the finish.

Doing that was actually fun

edit: haha or I could look one post up and see that I guess it's a bad idea after all. Shows what I know! Though it makes sense, if it were furniture that applied as much pressure, it'd be fine, but heels would probably make scrapes unless you were really careful walking.

MM, Don't you know that math isn't for girls? That's what my Barbie told me! :battingeyelashes:

[Vickicdgr]

I have laminate and it is literally undestructable. I wear my pointy ****tly heels on it, I have dropped all kinds of crap on it and it looks fine.
Well, not fine, because cleaning it is another b-i-t-c-h.

[trannie T]

Some contractors have cut corners by using substandard subfloors. If there is a void in the inner veneers it can be compressed by a spike heel. If you have a decent subfloor and are using quality flooring you will have no problem.

[trannie T]

I read MentalMercury's post and question her math. If the heels are 3/8 square then they are .105525 suare inch. As one walks the entire body weight will be on one heel theu creating a pressure of around 1500 pounds per square inch. My math too is open to question I was a liberal arts major and don't know much about math.

[MentalMercury]

MM, Don't you know that math isn't for girls? That's what my Barbie told me! :battingeyelashes:

Well I ain't a girl! :devil: I just like to pretend from time to time. And of course math is for girls.


I read MentalMercury's post and question her math. If the heels are 3/8 square then they are .105525 suare inch.

You're looking at the term "square" in terms of math, when I am talking about it terms of units of area.

When I say square inch, I mean that it's literally an area of one inch that is square, as opposed to an inch along just a line (one-dimensional vs. two-dimensional). What you did, which was squaring the original number isn't quite the same thing.

That's the area over which the pressure is applied to the floor, I doubled that area because there's 2 heel points that the weight is distributed to. Also the front of the shoes holds a little bit of the weight as well but I didn't count that into the equation.

If any geeks out there want the full details on what I punched into the young's modulus equation to determine the compression (dent depth) of our lovely lady's pine floor, feel free to ask! :p

[VirginiaX23]

Well I ain't a girl! :devil: I just like to pretend from time to time. And of course math is for girls.



I wouldn't argue with Barbie... did you see what she did to Ken? Poor guy never saw it coming.

[neowang]

If any geeks out there want the full details on what I punched into the young's modulus equation to determine the compression (dent depth) of our lovely lady's pine floor, feel free to ask! :p

I just saw this and my inner nerd can't let it go. Youngs modulus describes the tensile behavior of a material. Which is to say how it behaves when a pulling force is applied. A more valid approach would be to use the shear modulus, and then reference a materials chart to see if the resultant deformation was plastic (damaging) or elastic (non-damaging).

[Diane Douglas]

Wow, I guess it is a good thing that I am not an engineer. Because I came up with the following:
Assuming the heel is square, the area is .1406 sq inches (.375*.375). 160/.1406 = 1137psi. I am calculating using one heel, because when ou are walking, one foot will be in the air, leaving one foot on the ground.

The numbers become even more exciting when you look at a round heel (.1875*.1875*3.1415927) the psi increases to 1449.

Give me a few more minutes I might have the psi up to 5 tons or more. Now is that a standard ton, or a long ton.....

[Charona]

To add to the sport, that one heel is coming down fairly hard when you step on it. That's what makes the "click" you hear. It is said that some passenger airplane floors had to be redesigned when spike heels came into fashion, as the combination of high unit pressure, impact, and possible upward movement of the aircraft at the same time as the downward movement of the heel wearer caused some holes to be punched in the aluminum floors.

[MentalMercury]

I just saw this and my inner nerd can't let it go. Youngs modulus describes the tensile behavior of a material. Which is to say how it behaves when a pulling force is applied. A more valid approach would be to use the shear modulus, and then reference a materials chart to see if the resultant deformation was plastic (damaging) or elastic (non-damaging).

Doesn't young's modulus work both ways, as in, compression as well as expansion? I havn't used shear modulus in a class yet but it seems to be a similar concept. Would it be wrong to try and calculate the compression of the material as opposed to if it sheared or not?


Wow, I guess it is a good thing that I am not an engineer. Because I came up with the following:
Assuming the heel is square, the area is .1406 sq inches (.375*.375). 160/.1406 = 1137psi. I am calculating using one heel, because when ou are walking, one foot will be in the air, leaving one foot on the ground.

The numbers become even more exciting when you look at a round heel (.1875*.1875*3.1415927) the psi increases to 1449.

You multiplied the heel's areas times each other, which is the same deal as the other gal, 3/8th square inches is not the same thing as (3/8in) * (3/8in), you're mixing math vs. unit of measure; the little 2 next to 'inches' is not a mathematical term, it describes the kind of inches they are (2-dimensional ones, indicating that it's an area measurement as opposed to linear).

You did the same thing on the second one, but it was actually right, the area of a circle is pi*(radius squared) so you calculated the pressure if the entire 160 pounds rested on one of the heel tips and no other part of either shoe (and that's a small heel tip), so that seems realistic to me.

Also I agree, the weight would get distributed to one shoe as she walks, so double my original pressure. Which also doubles the compression to the equivalent length of two dust mites worth of compression since the equation I used is linear.

Since you asked, the equation was:
(E = young's modulus constant for pine wood = 1,300,000 in psi)

Force(pressure) = (E * area * change in length) / initial length

I plugged in the information I had, assuming a 4 inch thickness on the wood, and solved for change in length, which would be the wood compressing due to force in this case. The answer I got at first is what I was talking about earlier, a compression of a few micrometers, I looked on wikiedia to see what that length was equivalent to, and it was close to the length of a dust mite, thought that'd be an interesting way to put it into perspective.

Sorry I hijacked your thread Ronniewannabe :heehee:

[Jilmac]

As a retired carpenter I can say that I have installed plenty of laminate flooring and I know for a fact that it's harder than most natural hardwoods and will be totally unaffected by your heels. I love to hear the click-clack of my own heels on my floor. Luv and :hugs: Jill