Wood You Like F.A.Q. & News

"Floored by poor service" - we wonder why.

Times Troubleshooter (09.05.09 - third story) tells the following story:

In November we bought a Liberty Oak wooden floor from Allied Carpets for £630 for our children’s playroom. I contacted Allied in February because the floor was worn under my children’s computer chair. My children, aged 8 and 10, weigh 4st 8Ib and 5st respectively and should not be able to wear out in eight weeks a floor with a 25-year guarantee. Allied refused to help because the chair caused the damage. I do not believe that the floor is fit for purpose. Allied should have made it known at point of sale that it was unsuitable for homes with portable furniture.

After Troubleshooter intervened the big retailer grudgingly promised to replace the floor. The Chief Executive of Allied Carpets blamed the new supplier (Balterio) for not including after-care guidance to its products.

A quick search this morning on Balterio's (Belgium company) website (in English) revealed adequate maintenance and after-care information - including advice on chairs with wheels.

Even if Balterio hadn't included a leaflet to the product supplied to Allied Carpets, how about some initiative to give every single one of your clients a standard leaflet on the after-care on any type of floor-covering you sell?

We do, no matter if the floor comes with its own leaflet. Our clients are our clients, not really the clients of the manufacturer. Therefore we take care of the after-care - that is, in our honest opinion, our responsibility.

You can receive our maintenance leaflet too (including tips on stain removal) by popping in your name and email address in the form below. If your big retailer doesn't want to take their responsibility on after-care for the products they sell, feel free to borrow ours - we're proud to be a small and independent retailer who take customer care very seriously.

Request our maintenance leaflet and stain-removal tips to keep your wooden floor healthy and beautiful
Name:
Email:
We will never divulge your details to anyone else - we hate spam as much as you do

Guidelines on restoring floorboards

There are two different types of floorboards: softwood and hardwood. Pine boards are the most frequently found in 'modern' homes. You can of course re-sand them, but that won't reduce the ease with which dents and small damages appear.

 

If you accept this 'softwood' fact then there's nothing to stop your re-sanding the old existing pine boards in your home.

 

There is however one more thing to be aware of: where Oak matures into its characteristic Honey Colour, Pine tends to mature into orange - sometimes quite ugly orange too!

 

Applying a coloured HardWaxOil instead of a natural finish will often prevent this from happening. The colour most used for this is the "Golden Oak", either two coats or one coat Golden Oak and one, the last, coat natural HardWaxOil.

 

So instead of a nicely restored, but turning orange quit quickly, floor you end up with a nicely restored 'golden' brown floor - which could give you years and years of value. Do remember to apply a suitable maintenance product to it once every 5 - 6 months to keep your floor healthy and beautiful.

 

See our secure web shop for all available colours (and maintenance products!)

Alternative for Teak and Merbau mosaic - Mogno (Cambara) 5-fingers

If you are wondering we've turned colour-blind, no - not at all. But how can one wood species be an alternative for two rather different wood species: Teak is brown to grey - if untreated, not maintained for a long period of time - and Merbau is reddish brown with sometimes yellow streaks?

Both Teak and Merbau are among the more suspicious forest-deforestation sources (although when Wood You Like lists one or both types in our catalogue you can rest assured it comes from a sustainable source) and so the demand for especially Teak from sustainable sources is much higher than the supply.

Teak and Merbau have been used frequently in the 50's to 80's in mosaic floors (the so-called 5 finger mosaic or 5 finger basket weave) and many such floors are now rediscovered underneath carpets. Finding replacement blocks or additional blocks to extend the floor is rather difficult.

Now, tropical Mogno (Cambara) 5 finger mosaic is warm brown in colour - less reddish than Merbau but more reddish than Teak. It depends on how old your original Teak or Merbau floor is and if you have to sand it to bring it back to its original luster. Every wood type matures over time, and sanding will remove its aquired patina, almost starting the mature a new.

Some of our DIY floor restorers have used Mogno to add to existing Teak mosaic floors successfully and some have used it to repair/restore Merbau mosaic floors successfully. All fingers have their own character, old blocks and new blocks alike - which means the Mogno new addition can blend in, not completely perfect, but still.

In our webshop you can find many different wood species in the 7 and 5 finger mosaic catalogue, Mogno (Cambara) among them. You can request a small sample of the Mogno to see if it can be the solution for your own repair/restore job. (Just follow the link in our webshop underneath the image of the Mogno so we have your address details to send to sample to)

Or..... how about a complete new floor in Mogno? Warm brown and full of individual character? And rather economicly packed too: 0.67 sq m per pack.

Finish a tropical floor in the best and easiest way possible

The most popular wood type in the UK is still Oak, however there is plenty of choice in warm tropical species to create an unique interior design in your home. Existing rediscovered wooden floors like mosaic and design parquet are mostly made from tropical wood-species.

On unfinished Oak floors HardWaxOil is a great finishing product, combining two essential products: oil for long term protection and wax for your wear and tear layer, in one product.

Tropical species are more 'oily' on their own than Oak and frequently we hear stories about 'patchy' results when these floors are treated with HardWaxOil. This occurs when the HardWaxOil is not absorbed completely or evenly everywhere because of the 'oily' character of the wood itself.  

Wood You Like introduces the solution for this problem:
Euku Oil 1 combined with a simple maintenance product. In fact, it's going 'back' to the old principle of first sealing the floor and then applying a separate wear and tear layer. With one big difference: the old sealers contained too many VOC's - Volatile Organic Compounds, toxic.  

Euku Oil 1 doesn't and neither does the maintenance product. You only have to apply 1 coat of oil, wait 2 -3 hours - way quicker too than with HardWaxOil on tropical floors - and apply the maintenance product. Where in the old days hard wax had to be applied and buffed in, with Euku Oil 1 you can use a liquid wax-polish.

A great finish to any tropical hardwood floor!

Order on-line or call us for more information: 01233 - 713725

What you shouldn't do with Underfloor heating and wood: rugs

Wooden floors and underfloor heating are a good combination, especially when the Duoplank Oak range is used. This particular product is guaranteed which is quite different than suitable.

All of course depends on how the underfloor heating system is treated, the maximum temperature of the top floor (in this case the wooden floor) is allowed to reach is 28 degrees Celsius. Note, this is not the temperature of the water in water systems, the water itself will be warmer and depends on which system you have bought. Please refer to the instructions of the UFH system itself for guidance in this.

Underfloor heating is a so-called radiant heat source, 'radiating' its warmth to the room - versus convection heat from standard central heating radiators.

Your whole floor in fact radiates the warmth and this should therefore not be obstructed by placing rugs on your wooden floor.

This is what can happen when you do:

Two years after this floor was installed the owner noticed the rug (underneath a table) was lifting. Removing the rug he did not discover a hidden toy what he first thought was causing the 'bump' but the delaminating of one of the boards.
The extra insulation of the rug allowed a build up of heat which then softened the adhesive between toplayer and backing to aloow the tensions in the Oak to pull it apart.

Underfloor heating and wooden flooring is fine, adding a rug isn't!

Ageing Wood Concept: Restore your original Parquet floor to its original grandeur

During the 50's up to even the 90's many new homes were fitted with wood flooring: from floorboards (many without T&G) to Design Parquet floors. Many of these robust floors were covered with wall-to-wall carpet when this became in fashion. Such a petty!

Then in this decennia, very fortunately, many of these beautiful and valuable wood floors are being re-discovered again. You can see at the number of wood guides dedicated to cleaning and/or repairing original wood floors it is an area where Wood You Like will advice you on too.

9 times out of 10 a bit of TLC is enough to bring back the floor's old lustre, but sometimes (mostly due to plumbing or other building activities in the past) there has to be some repair work done. The main 'problem' with restoring an original Oak floor is that by sanding off the old finish layers, the height differences and deep scratches, the original warm patina is removed too. The old floor looks rather new again, loosing its authentic grandeur.

 Not any longer!

Wood You Like can now provide floor-restorers the Ageing Wood Concept, a simple but effective and none-hazardous way to restore any sanded Oak wood floor to its authentic character.

 

Wood Guide turns Ebooklet

New Ebooklet (wood-guide): “7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore your Design Parquet Floor”

Filled with tips and advice from the professionals on preparations, re installing loose blocks or installing replacement blocks, finding out what wood-species was used in your original floors, how to sand and apply a new finish and much, much more. With ‘work-in-progress’ photos.

"Wow, thanks for that -- certainly the best how-to guide I have seen to this. It's always helpful, especially, when something says "Ideally, do ABC, but if you can't, then X Y or Z can happen", instead of just "Do ABC." -- i.e. I know I should remove the bitumen from the floor, but it isn't possible to remove all of it, so it is just good to know what happens if I don't."
V.F. Northamptonshire

Extras included:

• Ebooklet “3 Easy steps to clean and maintain your parquet floor”;
• Ebooklet “The Benefits and Advantages of Natural Wooden Flooring “ (normally £ 5.97);
• images of most common wood-species used,
• Wood You Like’s maintenance leaflet and
• Wood You Like’s report: Things not to expect from your wood floor

Buy now for only £ 6.97 and restore your newly rediscovered design parquet floor to its original glory and lustre. A labour of love result that will keep its value for many years to come!

Don’t move – improve the hidden treasures your home already has. Increase the value of your home in the most simple and cost effective way! Read this fact sheet on how and why wooden flooring adds long-term value to your home - 95% of estate agents agree.

Only £ 6.97

Cast iron buffing block now with 100% guarantee

The most effective and eco-friendly way to maintain your natural wooden floor the easy way! 100% guaranteed!

Every wooden floor benefits from maintenance treatments. Modern polishes are easy to apply and our eco-friendly 7kg weighing cast-iron buffing block makes light work of it.

Read more.......

New Wood Floor Guide: "3 Easy Steps to Clean and Mantain Your Parquet Floor"

3 Easy Steps to Clean and Maintain Your Parquet Floor (or any other wooden floor)

What is a nicer surprise than to remove the carpet from a room in your home and to discover a valuable original parquet floor is hiding beneath it! Especially when you consider that installing a brand new parquet floor costs around £ 125.00 - £ 145.00 per sq m. And that’s just for a simple herringbone or basket weave pattern.

Your new discovery will at least need some TLC to bring back its grand lustre it had before it was ‘covered-up’. Follow our “3 easy steps" below and you will start enjoying your valuable, easy to clean and anti-allergic original parquet floor in no time at all.

Read more......

New Wood Floor Guide: "7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore Your Parquet Floor"

7 Easy Steps To Repair/Restore You Parquet Floor

What is a nicer surprise than to remove the carpet from a room in your home and to discover a valuable original parquet floor is hiding beneath it! Especially when you consider that installing a brand new parquet floor costs around £ 125.00 - £ 145.00 per sq m. And that’s just for a simple herringbone or basket weave pattern.

Your new discovery will at least need some TLC to bring back its grand lustre it had before it was ‘covered-up’, see our “3 easy steps to clean and maintain your parquet floor” for this.

If your floor is missing some blocks, has damaged blocks – damages from plumbing comes to mind - or you notice areas where the blocks no longer stuck firmly down on the underfloor just follow the 7 Easy Steps below to repair/restore it and start enjoying your valuable, easy to clean and anti-allergic original parquet floor in no time at all. For all materials needed we’ve included a list of quality products underneath.

Read more....

How to restore a Parquet floor - what to be aware of

This week we received another question on the subject of a rediscovered parquet floor:

Good Afternoon,

I wonder if I could pick your brains a little.  We have just uncovered a parquet floor - 6 bricks @ 4.5"x7/8" in blocks at 90 degree angles to one another. Floor area is 14'x11' & rectangular - no cupboards or inaccessible areas.  Mahogany wood or so I'm told - the wood is certainly very dark all the way through.  The floor has had some previous repairs after two rooms were knocked together & plumbing works (around 6 years ago).  We are planning on restoring the floor to leave it exposed now.

To do so we need to sand the floor & then seal & varnish it (need a pretty heavy duty finish as the only back door to our garden is through the living room & we have a dog with a number of very scratchy nails on each corner).

I wondered if you could answer the following questions:

1. Assuming that the floor is prepared & suitably coloured already would it be correct to say that I would need to seal the floor first (~4 hours to dry) then varnish 2-3 times (~ 8 hours to dry between each coating).  Is this about right (depending on the specific instructions on any manufacturers products of course)?
2. I am planning on having some quotes for professionals to do this work as well as costing it to do ourselves but I wondered could you give me some sort of 'ball park' idea of the cost of such a renovation?
3. What sort of time frame would you expect such renovations to take?
4. I cannot seem to find anyone registered with the BWFA in or near Wiltshire.  Are you able to recommend (or warn me to avoid) any companies local to me?

Hope you can help me - I'm trying to educate myself sufficiently as I have invited a couple of companies to quote to me.

Thank you so much,

Kind Regards

Mrs S N

Our tips on what any company quoting for a particular job like this should do/use and products we recommend:

Thank you for your question. Nice find a floor like that!

Who ever is going to restore this floor should note the following: any loose blocks? If so with what material were they glued to the floor - presumably bitumen. Any loose blocks should be cleaned off this black stuff as best as possible, likewise with the any visual residue on the underfloor. Then the blocks can be glued back to the underfloor with modern adhesive, but bitumen residue will have an effect on the bonding time (normally 4 - 8 hours, with bitumen involved it could take upto 24 - 36 hours!).

Also, when sanding the floor use a belt-sander not a drum-sander (ask any company who's quoting for this work what type of sander they're plannig to use and insist on a belt-sander).
A hard wearing finish could indeed be varnish - modern varnish sometimes include this so-called sealer - but we ourselves prefer HardWaxOil natural which brings out the natural character of the wood better than varnish, is hard wearing and small damages can be easier repaid than when varnish is used.

It's hard for us to give you a 'ball-park' figure without having seen the floor in situ - i.e. not knowing exactly the amount of work it would involve - but between low-end and high-end of work needed: between £ 35.00 and £ 50.00 per sq m ex VAT including the finishing materials.

Hope this helps

Kind Regards
Wood You Like Ltd

Hi Karin,

Just a quick note to thank you so much for you immediate reply which was much appreciated & which very definitely does help.  I also would like to compliment you on your extensive website which I have found fabulously useful & informative.

Kind Regards

Mrs S N

(If you have a question on this subject, or any other wood flooring related issue, fill in this simple form and we will personally give you our best advice as quick as possible)

See also our Wood Floor Guide: "7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore Your Parquet Floor"

Discovering a Oak parquet floor - how to restore?

One of the questions we received last week:

Dear Wood You Like

I have just discovered under carpet a floor of oak wood blocks (in a herringbone pattern and in a generally good condition). The location is the hallway (approximately 9 square meters).

80% of the blocks were loose so I have lifted them all and cleaned them as much as I can, however I haven't been able to remove the bitumen (which is generally only a thin layer) that held them to the concrete floor.

Once I have relaid them I would like to sand and satin a lighter more even colour.

My questions are:

1. What can I use to re-stick them to the floor that will ensure adhesion, ease of application and fairly quick use afterwards. I have had variuous suggestions that include: Everbuild Pink Grip grab adhesive; Everbuild 908 DPM; Ruberoid syntheprufe; Laybond L17 Woodblock. What would you recommend of these or of any other product?

2. What dye/stain product would you advise?

3. What method of gap filling (and product) would be best?

4. What sealing product to maintain a hard wearing finish?

Thank you. I look forward to hearing from you.

Mr G.B.

Our answer:

If there is only a thin layer of bitumen left on blocks and underfloor it is best to use Lecol5500

Be aware that the residue of bitumen will increase the time it takes for the adhesive to bond properly. Normally it takes around 6- 8 hours, it could take up to 24 hours or longer when there is bitumen involved. So be careful when walking on it and when sanding the floor.

As for the finish layer, we recommend a coloured HardWaxOil, this gives a long term protection and a natural look, no matter what colour you use. It stains and seals the wood in two layers - no other products needed.

For filler (to be mixed with sands-dust of the second sanding) we recommend Lecol7500

Hope this helps to restore your rediscovered parquet floor, a valued possession in any house!

See also our Wood Floor Guides:
"7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore Your Parquet Floor"
and
"Ageing Wood Concept" - restoring your Oak original floor

Two questions: one problem, one answer - sort of

Recently we received two very similar questions through our Get Free Advice web form:
Question one (from the chair of a village hall)
I am looking for some advice. We have a village hall floor with parquet floor 17.1m x 8.6m which is in need of some attention. There is a residual lacquer finish on approx 60% of the floor with the high traffic areas with little or no protection.

We have a weekly clean which involves a good brush and then a hard floor cleaning product (Carefree Mop & Shine). The hall itself is well used and the hirers are not necessarily always diligent with sweeping the floor. We are likely to have water spillages on occasions that are cleaned up after an hour, sand spills which are cleaned up but residue could be an issue, finally a dance class who do or don’t dust the floor (depending on who you talk to) with French chalk. Your comments on the above would be useful please.

What would your recommendation be for the finish: lacquer or hard wax oil? Lacquer is what we have had before but hard wax oil might be better because of the ability to keep on top of the wearing areas.

Finally is there any advice you can provide on maintenance regime, cleaners, treatments and equipment. At present we have hand brooms and mops used by both hires and our cleaner. We also have tiled and linoleum floors in changing rooms, kitchen, corridors and reception areas. One thought was we should use some form of vacuuming to improve the cleanliness of the hall and better preserve the floor finishes.

Many Thanks
Mr J N (chair)

Question two (from The Guardian Saturday Magazine):
I write for the Space Solves section of The Guardian Saturday magazine, answering readers questions on their cleaning and stain removal problems. We have had a query in regarding a parquet floor. Could you advise?

"Our parquet flooring was installed about 28 years ago and has a light to mid yellowish tinge. Where it has been heavily trodden on, it is black while other parts are stained and faded. I usually clean it with a damp soapy (liquid Flash - not too much! or Ecover washing up liquid!) string  mop, no more than that.  Then go over with a clean damp mop. Do you have any suggestion for how I could lift the stains?"

Mrs S Z (The Guardian)

To both questions we replied (roughly) with the same answer:

Thank you for your question, we will try to advice you to the best of our knowledge.

A wooden floor with damaged lacquer finish has indeed lost its capacity to protect the wood from water spills and might display dark (blackened) areas where the lacquer layer has vanished almost completely. To keep mopping the floor with water will only make this worse and you might end up with very deep dark patched where the water has had chance to penetrate the wood constantly.

We strongly recommend the floor to be restored as soon as possible to reduce the chance of it being beyond simple repair. We suggest you search for a reputable company in your area that can sand the floor to remove the old lacquer layer completely and to apply a hard wearing, possibly HardWaxOil for easy maintenance and easy small repairs, new finish layer.

Instead of weekly mopping with clean and shine we recommend the use of WoCa cleaning soap (Woodcare Denmark, TripTrap) which contains both a non-abrasive detergent and a polish so the floor will be cleaned and protected against dirt and drips in one go. For such a large area we recommend the use of a professional buffing machine that can tackle both the weekly cleaning as well as the quarterly additional maintenance to feed both the wood as the wax wear layer.

Such a machine can also easily be used on the other floor covering types you mentioned.
As for daily care we would rather advice the use of a soft broom instead of a vacuum cleaner. Two reasons for this: sweeping a floor shows 'optical' proof the activity is a useful one  and secondly to prevent damages to the floor from damaged vacuum cleaner wheels or choosing the wrong 'brush-setting' (causing scratches when the brush has been retracted)

My only concern is the sand spillages, if that happens straight after a cleaning or maintenance round the sand might get stuck into the applied product and show up as dirty patch, resulting possibly in a kind of abrasive effect.

For The Guardian we also added:

Our TripTrap (WoCa) cleaning soap contains both a gentle detergent AND a polish which cleans and feeds the wooden floor in one go. Always use a slightly damp cloth - don't use buckets of water!
Every 5 to 6 months a wooden floor should receive a maintenance service: applying a suitable for the finish (lacquer or oil) used maintenance product to keep wood and finish layer healthy.
For more information on regular maintenance and stain-removals you could redirect your readers to our information pages.

Hope this helps.

We received two emails in reply:

"That's fantastic advice, many thanks."
"Many thanks for you advice – excellent information."

At your service, as always.

Q: Should I sand down a cupped floor?

Wood works, always. It adjusts itself to the moist-content in your home: expands when there is an increase and shrinks when there is an decrease. That's the reason why we recommend to leave a sufficiently wide expansion gap around the whole perimeter of your wooden floor - it gives your floor 'room' to move - and it will, no matter which installation method you use.

Cupping of a floor happens when the floor absorbs so much moist it fills its expansion gap completely - or is 'stuck' in one spot due to very heavy furniture, faulty installation method - and has to go somewhere - up.
Excessive circumstances can happen to everyone: a leak, a flood etc, but those are temporary circumstances. 9 times out of 10 it's a case of 'removing' the cause and the cupped floor will settle again to its normal state.

However, we frequently get the question: "Should I sand down a cupped floor?"

The picture underneath explains what will happen then (click on the picture to see its full size).

It will 'look' fine temporarily, but as soon as the normal house climate is restored the floor will 'crown' - forever!

Best solution to resolve cupped floors: find the cause first e.g. leak, heavy downpour causing more moist than normal in the void beneath the wood floor, new appliance in the room or connecting area that causes more moist than normal - think of a tumble dryer, dish-washer etc - sudden and hefty increase in air humidity outside due to the seasons.
Some of the causes you can resolve, some you can't - or not easy or quickly. But if you don't know what causes the cupping then you can keep having the same problem over and over again.

To reduce the strain in your wood floor that is causing the cupping-effect: remove beading or skirting along one side of the room that runs parallel with the direction the floorboards are installed - wood hardly expands lengthways - and saw or chisel off a small strip of the last row. You'll be amazed how little you need to cut off this way for the floor to 'settle into place again - so start 'tiny', you can always redo the procedure.
A circular plunge-saw comes in very handy in these cases - quick and simple.

Floor sanding, tips and best tools

Discovering an original parquet floor underneath an old wall-to-wall carpet is a great and valuable discovery. Specially if the floor is still in one piece, i.e. no rows or tiles removed for installing a central heating system or other 'modern' plumbing work.

(See also our Wood Floor Guide: "7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore Your Parquet Floor")

Restoring the parquet floor to its original lustre is really a 'labour of love', but with the right tools and products it will regain its beauty for many years to come. First up is to remove all carpet residue, like the sticky (rubber) underlayment. Scrapping will get most off. If you need to use chemicals try it out first in a corner behind a door - ventilate the room sufficiently and READ the instruction before hand!

Many old parquet floors were stuck down with bitumen which over time can become very brittle and loose its bonding power. Loose blocks (rattling underneath your feet when you walk over it) could be the result. Most old wood blocks have small T&G's all around, lifting one of the block could result in a kind of cascading effect, more loose blocks. So be careful when trying to remove loose blocks.
Before you re-install the lifted blocks remove as much of the bitumen from block and underfloor as possible. Any large residue of the bitumen will make the floor uneven, plus the time the modern adhesive will take to fully bond with block and underfloor will be longer - in cases we've seen even days longer!

Some re-found original parquet floors only need a bit of extra TLC, remove all dirt and apply a suitable maintenance product.
Others however take more work, specially when blocks had to re-installed (or 'new' blocks found to fill in empty spaces), the wear and tear layer is rather damaged (by carpet grippers etc). Then sanding the whole floor is the only solution (such a shame to cover your valuable parquet floor with carpet again!).

Before you go out and hire the first sander you can find, a word (two words really) of advice: remove what's left of the old finish material and hire the proper sanding equipment.
No matter with what grit you start sanding, if your old floor still has layers upon layers of wax on and in it you'll spend a fortune on sanding sheets! Try out a tiny corner of the floor with a sanding paper by hand. If the paper fills right up and spreads rubbish (warmed wax) all over the floor you'll first have to remove this old wear and tear layer. Apply Wax and Polish remover - turpentine or white spirit based - on a cloth and remove the old layers as best as possible. Again, VENTILATE & READ the instructions on the tin/bottle.

For the best end result after sanding your original parquet flooring you'll have to use (hire) a professional belt-sander (and edge-sander). Like the description says a belt-sander has a continuous (or endless) belt, or rather continuous (or endless) sanding paper - called Belt cloth. These belts are very easy to 'wrap' around the drum of the sander (1 minute tops), but most importantly will give the smoothest results on your floor.

Most DIY hire centres can only supply you with the (much lighter) drum-sander. Drum sanders have sheets of sanding paper, that has to be wrapped around the drum and fixed firmly in place with a metal bar. This metal bar, when not attached correctly will create shatter marks all over your floor. The problem is that those shatter marks will mostly only show up AFTER you applied the finish product (varnish or HardWaxOil). Trying to remove these marks with a rotary sander will create another problem: circular marks in your floor.

So for a 'professional' restored original parquet floor use/hire professional tools.

More tips and advice on restoring existing Oak flooring see our Wood-Guide on the "Ageing Wood Concept" - retoring even the authentic patina of your Oak floor.

BEST BUY Maintenance product

As all of our clients know we always include a maintenance leaflet - filled with tips and advice to keep your natural wooden floor healthy and 'good-looking' - when we deliver the floor or when we have completed the professional installation of it.
Our showroom stocks maintenance products for any type of finish, be it oiled or varnished, of course of the highest quality.

One of our products: the Lecol/Leha Wax-Polish - StepStop OH36 - has been named BEST BUY in maintenance products for natural wooden flooring by the Dutch Consumer Union (the Dutch 'Which' organisation).
Our price: only £ 13.30 per tin (including VAT), which can cover 70 - 80 sq m!

The StepStop is a liquid polish, easy to apply and when regularly used - every 5 - 6 months - will feed the wood and protect your oiled floor against dirt and drips.
Regular maintenance always enhances your floor. If pressed for time, we can even do the maintenance for you (in the East-Kent area)

Name:
Email:

Wooden Flooring Finish: oil or lacquer? Advantages and Disadvantages

One of the hardest questions to answer is: what makes a better finish, lacquer or oil/HardWaxOil?

First of all it’s down to personal taste and secondly to what is expected of the floor, e.g. easy maintenance, shiny look or natural appearance of the wood.

Historical the wax floor is still seen as very labour intensive to maintain, who doesn’t have memories of caretakers buffing away endlessly week after week after week (be it your “Gran” or the school caretaker). Then came the ‘modern’ lacquer (and synthetic and affordable wall-to-wall carpets) and the original wax floor almost became extinct.

For many decades..................(read more)

Gaps in floorboards: not to worry

It's that time of the year again: gaps appearing in floorboards

In this period our web site is being found by a lot by people "Googling" on: floorboard gap; floorboard gap filler; gaps in floorboards, etc.
We "wood like" to explain that in this time of the year and with this weather that gaps appearing in floorboards is pretty usual. We keep track of the air humidity in our house and shop on a daily basis and during the end of autumn and winter it can drop as low as 35 - 40%

Wood works all year round and when the weather (climate) gets dryer, wood will get dryer also (as will your skin). Then it is very normal for floorboards to shrink and for gaps to appear. These gaps will disappear again when the air humidity gets higher

It's no use to fill them; it's part of the way wood works.

What you could do (to keep the wood and also yourself healthy): attach ceramic water containers on radiators (check regularly that they are still filled with water; you can also add a few drop of a fragrant in for a nicer or fresher smell) or hang a damp tea-towel (not dripping wet!) on radiators; that will increase the humidity slightly.


For more on wooden flooring and house-climate see here

Salt

We are not sure if you are hoping for a mild winter or for a White Christmas. Which ever it will be, we are sure to have some cold-spells in the next three or even four months: Winter is on its way!

In our October newsletter we already mentioned that wooden floors benefit from extra TLC. 'Pampering' your floor by applying a maintenance product every 5 to 6 months will keep the wood protected against dirt and drips and enchance its beauty. Special care is recommended when salt from the gritting on icy and/or snowy roads comes on your floor through wet-shoe prints. Not all entrance mats 'wipe' the bottom of your shoes completely dry.
To prevent the salt effecting the wooden floor there are a few simple things you can do:

• Leave shoes on the mat (or kick off your shoes on the mat and store them in a shoe cupboard - if you have such a novel item - or area that is tiled. To prevent the tiles coming dirty or smutched, put an old newspaper on the floor first).
• Leave shoes in the porch and have slippers at the ready - warmed-up slippers is really a nice treat after a walk in the cold.
• Wipe wet-shoe prints dry the moment you notice them so the salt doesn't get a change to effect the wood.
• Make sure your wooden floor has received its extra TLC before the winter becomes wintry.

Q: water left standing on new oiled floor

Question:
Thank you for your website, it has been a great help.

We have new oiled oak floors. The workers who were fixing other parts of the house have created lasting water spots on the floor. They have now said they will have to sand the whole floors to treat those spots.

Is that accurate? Does that reduce the value of the new floor?

Answer:

Our answer depends on two - three issues:
how long the new floor has been down, how long the spillage has had time to cause 'damage' and if the water was polluted (like leaks from central heating radiators) and if any extra oil or maintenance products has been applied before the spillage happened.

It could be that the oil has protected the wood from definite staining and that the 'stain' sits on the oil/wax. Rub a small part of the stain with steel wool 0000 to see if this is the case. If so, rub the whole area down with steel wool and apply either the used oil or a suitable maintenance product.

If the water has stained the wood itself then light sanding (locally) is indeed needed. Be aware that water spillage can cause very deep and dark staining of Oak.

Because your floor has been oiled local sanding is possible. After sanding oil has to be applied again but compared with lacquer or varnish the 'new' area will not create a 'patchy' appearance.
Any reduction in value of the floor depends on how deep (if any) the stain has penetrated: how much has to be sanded off locally, reducing the thickness of the boards in that area.

Hope this helps.

Autumn = extra TLC for your floor (and home)

Autumn is here. This season means the start of the heating season for most of us: central heating systems are switched on again on most evenings and even in early mornings; wood-fires are lighted on one or two weekend evenings perhaps?

Besides keeping the cold outside the heating season also means keeping the humidity out. Radiators (including UFH) and wood-fires lower the level of air-humidity in your home and when not monitored and corrected could cause your natural wooden floor (and your skin!) to become dry (shrinking of the board, dehydrated and itchy skin). To keep both your wooden floor and yourself in good condition in this and next season we recommend you keep an eye on the air-humidity in your home in order for you to adjust/increase the humidity. And there are very simple ways to do this, from having plants in you home, hanging porcelain water containers on radiators and to ventilate your home daily.

The simplest way to check your home's humidity is to use a Maximum-Minimum Indoor Thermometer and Hygrometer.
Available from our showroom for just £ 17.50 (ex VAT, including battery, instructions of use and Wood You Like’s leaflet on House-climate).

All natural wooden flooring will benefit from a maintenance service before the real heating season starts: the wax or polish will hydrate the top wear layer of the wood (or the lacquer film) and like with applying a moisturiser to your own skin it will prevent dehydration of the wood. Especially when you have underfloor heating it is really recommended to apply a (extra) maintenance product this month.

FAQ Maintenance and Care

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Or check out our Wood Floor Guides:

"Do you know how to immediately increase the value of your house and comfort of your home?"

"7 Easy Steps to Repair/Restore your Parquet Floor"

"3 Easy STeps to Clean and Maintain your Parquet Floor"