sanding your old wooden floor can give the whole home a new lease of life
What happens when you sand your wooden floor?
A floor over time, regardless of what protection was used, will age and wear. It is after all a natural product. The sun light will lighten sections, rugs will cause shaded spots, furniture and walking traffic all take its toll eventually on your lovely wooden floor and it can get to look quite tired.
A floor has a life span of around 30 years in general (depending on the thickness and quality of the floor). Typically people will sand their floor every 7-10 years and re-treat it. This removes the previous protective layer and about 1mm of the wood taking it back to its natural raw colour and then you may decide which treatment you would like again, it can be a completely new colour or product.
Can I sand my own floor?
Sanding wooden flooring is a delicate process and mistakes are very easily made without using the right equipment and processes. This can literally take 10’s of years off the life of your floor.
When applying the protection layer once a floor has been sanded it’s absolutely vital you are 100% sure the floor has been sanded well otherwise the oil/varnish will take to all of the sanding errors and totally destroy a floor. Nobody wants this…
What happens after the floor has been sanded?
Once your floor has been sanded, it will then need to be protected. 1 to 3 coats of oils or varnishes are applied (depending on the product) and then this will need to dry.
Once a protection layer has been applied, you will not be able to walk on your floor for around 24 hours (the longer the better) - After 24 hours you may walk carefully however the oil will still be drying and hardening for the next 1 month + so covering is not recommended.
Whats included when we sand your floor…
All materials, machinery and labour costs are included in our initial price. Once we sand your floor, we will also protect it in a finish of your choice; We can help you decide this.
When the job is complete, we will leave you 1x bottle of cleaning soap which you can apply once every couple of weeks ***START USING AFTER ONE MONTH OF FINISHING - UNTIL THEN ONLY VACUUM*** and in heavy traffic areas such as kitchens you can use once a week or more. The instructions will be on the bottle. You use it as you would normally mop a floor with a very light damp cloth not too abrasive and lightly clean your floor. Each time you use this it will add a small protection layer to your floor whilst cleaning it and giving the floor a fuller colour. We’ll show you where you can buy this for when you are out.
Your floor is a natural product which needs looking after. We will explain how is best to do this.