Archive for the ‘wood floor’ tag
Hardwood Flooring Types For Any Home no comments
The hardwood floor is one that has been around for ages. A lot of people rely on the hard wood floor because it offers families a luxury of choice and blends well with the interior design of the home. There are various advantages of it, some of these being the following:
1. It lends a sense of permanence to a residence.
2. It has the advantage of a long tradition behind it; this is because it is one of the earliest floors to be used.
3. It gives your home an air of class and prestige
Despite the obvious advantages of a hard wood floor, it is essential to know that it is also prone to surface stains. This is because of its major diversity in material type.
There are two major types of hardwood floors. These are prefinished and unfinished.
The prefinished floor is better because it is convenient as there is no need for sanding. The prefinished floor has a smooth and refined surface. This is because the wood has been polished at the mill during production.
The unfinished floor has a more uniformed seal and is used mostly by professionals and also in offices. It is advisable to use this type of hardwood floor for places that have a lot of activities going on. This is because the floor has a higher durability and can easily absorb stains.
There are different species associated with hard wood floors. Common among the hardwood floor species are the following.
A. American cherry; this particular wood type is used mostly in making cabinet. This specie is popular because it is very easy to work with and has a color that darkens over time and becomes richer in tone.
B. Brazilian cherry; this specie is reddish brown in color and very hard.
C. Red and White oak; these species have a paler color than the other two. The white oak is harder than the red oak and tougher to saw and nail.
D. Hard maple; this brand of hardwood flooring is harder than the oak.
In choosing the hard wood for your own floor surface you must ensure that you use it only when it has been installed by a professional. Choose an appropriate moisture holder to use in between the wood. Follow your budget, your taste and your heart when choosing.
Don’t use excessive water when cleaning and ensure that your wood is free from dampness and moisture. Don’t use steel wood to clean your hard wood. Ensure that all dam rags are removed from the floor promptly.
Hardwood flooring is advantageous only when proper attention is given to it so be sure to give good care to your hardwood floor because the way your home is, it tells a lot about you.
To heat it properly during the winter, wood floor heating is one of the best options out there right now. To see which exact type is best for your own floor, read this article on electric or hydronc floor heating differences.
How to Install Your Hardwood Floor Without a Hitch no comments
No matter what type of flooring you want to have installed in your home, be it hardwood or engineered flooring, real wood flooring, laminate flooring or something else, you need to know something about installing hard wood floors as you will need them for installing practically each of these flooring types. One of the best ways to have your floor looking great is by using hardwood. There are so many different types of flooring nowadays that not using hardwood is almost impossible to imagine.
When using regular hardwood flooring, your first task is to place a sub-floor which will secure your hard-wood flooring in place. This will make sure that you can have your wood floor installation over concrete slabs or over already existing floors. It also gives an additional layer of insulation that keeps moisture away.
If the area has too much moisture anyway, you should avoid using hardwood material. For places with less moisture using engineered flooring will help because it usually holds up low levels of moisture without being adversely affected by it.
Also bathrooms are not a very good place to use hard wood as flooring option because of the spills of water which can ruin the material quite easily. A better option would be laminate flooring which is able to keep getting wet without major problems. Laminate wood is not the real deal, however it has an appearance of wood, so for a cheaper alternative this material also should do in relatively hidden places.
When laying down the hardwood flooring, there are a few things that you need to do, such as sanding down the floor so it loses those rough spots that are covering the nails and also becomes smoothed out. Next you need to stain and finish the floor. While a tedious and tiring task that can take a while, it has to be done. Just make sure that you don’t have children or pets walking all over the area while doing this, as it cannot be trampled over.
You can do the hard-wood floor installation by yourself if you have the know-how, materials and the tools, however if you have never done it before, just learning from the web or from a DYI 101 book will not suffice. This is when you need to enlist the help of a professional who has done it countless times before. There are many professional flooring installation services available that for a price will do a great job on flooring your kitchen or designated area. The most important is to find a nice, appealing style of hardwood material that will match that of the room it will be put in.
Engineered wood floor is very popular nowadays without being as expensive as the real wood floor, while still being the real deal. To read more about it visit my website at http://www.engineeredwoodfloor.org/