Caring for and Maintaining Your Wood Floor

Keeping your wood and laminate flooring in optimal condition can be made simple with a few insider tips. Floorsave put this guide together to help you enjoy your new flooring for as long a time as possible.

Heavy furniture:

One of the main ways to damage a real wood floor (not laminate) is from the indentations made by sofas and beds. Because they also carry human weight more acute pressure passes through the contact points/ legs which increase indentation, bruises and dents.

• TIP - Floorsave highly recommend spreading the load between pressure points by using caster cups.
• TIP - You can buy caster cups from any local DIY store in all varieties of shapes and colours
• TIP - Make sure bottom of cup is made from cork so no indent, Unika is a brand we have always recommended.

Entrance matting:

This is an important consideration to make when planning your new floor because it can help save your new flooring from trod in dirt, grit, small stones and sediment.

Entrance matting can be fitted in your hallway next to your front door and comes in an array of colours; Coir is the most popular material and is made out of Coconut husk. Coir comes in a variety of colours; the most popular colour is natural camel and comes in 1 and 2 metre rolls.

To fit simply install an end bar where you want the flooring to finish and the entrance matting to start. This area is called a mat well and can be either the full width of you hallway or can be mitred to size to fit just your front door.

• TIP - Floorsave always keep 1 and 2 metre rolls stock

Humidity

Wood is hygroscopic which means it likes water; it will always try to reach a moisture content balance in relation to the relative humidity of its environment. Woods natural ability to attract and hold water molecules from the surrounding environment is not cause for concern if humidity is taken into consideration when planning and installing your new floor.

If the air in a room is too dry it will suck the water out of your new floor and eventually cause it to crack. If the air is too moist your floor will take on-board excess water and cause it to cup.

Relative guidelines for temperature and humidity:

The equilibrium moisture content (BS82011) is recommended to be between 6% and 19% depending on room, location of property and whether or not there is under-floor heating.

The relative humidity (rh) should be above 35% and significantly below 70%.

Room temperature should be between 64 – 75 F.

Cleaning:

Maintaining a robust cleaning schedule is quite often the key to making anything last a long time. Before you start make sure you vacuum all dust up thoroughly making sure you get into all the corners and edges.

• TIP - If your vacuum cleaner has a beater bar you run the risk
  of leaving tiny scratches on your floor.

The product we recommended for cleaning Laminate flooring is Easy Shine,
it comes with a trigger spray. Simply vacuum, spray then clean with a dry flat mop.

To get best results on Lacquered/ varnished/ oiled and real wood floors use Floor Service Parquet Cleaner. It comes in a 5 liter container and a mop and bucket is required.

Small spills

Soak up as much liquid as possible using a porous cloth or kitchen towel, then clean the area with one of the above methods to remove sticky areas.

Large spills

You may have to use a dry mop to soak up liquid, make sure you ring out the mop regularly into a bucket. Once the majority of liquid is removed, soak up the rest with a porous cloth or kitchen towel. Then use any one of the above cleaning methods to remove sticky patches. If we have missed something please let us know and if you have further questions please contact our knowledgeable and friendly team.