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Have you got fir flooring in your house that need refinishing?

Fir floors are one of the most beautiful floors within many homes throughout North America. It was probably the most well-known types of flooring installed here for quite some time due to its easy availability.

But fir floors have many unique characteristics compared to true hardwood floors like red and white oak. This means the appearance and functionality of your floor will differ considerably from those of an oak ground. If you would like to be thrilled with your floors, after that understanding these distinctions is really important. To start with...

- Fir Is Very Soft -

Fir is approximately 100% more vulnerable to impact damage than red or light oak. The timber flooring industry has a guide to inform the density of different types of real wood called the Janka Hardness Level. This test procedures the force necessary to embed a.444 inch steel ball to half its diameter in different types of wood. Upon this scale, white oak prices at 1360, reddish colored oak 1290 and fir in the bottom with a lowly 660. Because they're so soft, fir floors are a lot more difficult to refinish.

Great care needs to be taken to ensure the complete minimum amount of wood is removed through the sanding process. This takes a lot of skill and years of encounter. This is among the easiest floors to mess up if you do not know what you are doing. Many fir flooring become ruined by extremely deep drum marks due to inexperienced hardwood floor refinishing companies.

Once these drum marks (caused by leaving the drum sander in a single spot too much time) are produced, the only way to remove them is to sand the surrounding areas flat to the same depth. This requires decades off the life of a floor and in cases of already thin flooring, it can mean having to replace huge sections with reclaimed wood.

Fir is definitely not the type of flooring to practice your sanding abilities on.

- Mottling or Bruising -

Refinished fir floors often exhibit another characteristic known as mottling or bruising. The extent of this bruising can vary greatly from room to room and also from area to region within an individual room. In high traffic areas or close to the perimeter of an area, the fir often displays darker, blotchy areas. Most of this is due to many years of foot visitors and wear. The framework of fibers and cells in soft fir is very different to hardwoods like oak. As traffic makes its way across the floor over a long time, fir becomes bruised which turns up as darker, blotchy areas in the ground.

It isn't uncommon in order to tell exactly where furniture had been placed for several years in an area. It is possible to see a light patch that's exactly how big is a bed or dresser encircled by a darker region which shows the occupants walking path. Usually you will see a darker path to the closets and entry of the room as well. Unfortunately there is definitely nothing that can be done to guarantee this organic occurrence of mottling, bruising or blotching won't occur. In fact the only assurance that it will not show up is if you install a new floor.

- Your Fir Floors May Be Very Thin -

Through the years your floors may have been refinished many times, particularly if you have a heritage home built before 1940. Due to several sandings, the thickness of the timber eventually decreases and the heads of fingernails begin showing between the boards. If your fir flooring are this thin, sometimes refinishing is not an option, and installation of a new floor could be necessary.

Sometimes though this is often a false assumption, particularly if there is just a few nail heads showing and they are irregularly scattered through the entire floor. The initial installer might not have fully set the nail in fact it is right now sitting higher in the floor compared to the rest. Also, these fir floors set up over a ship lap sub-floor can be extremely loose and have a lot of movement. It could be the case that the nail provides slowly worked its method to the top over the years and just must be set again. Therefore do not let someone tell you that they can not become restored unless they are absolutely certain they are unrecoverable.

Another clue they may be too thin is to look at the very best of the grooves. If they are splitting and breaking off, there exists a good chance there is not enough timber remaining to sand. You could also place a knife blade down between one of the boards (if there is a gap) and measure how much wood is still left. The measurement will be the difference between your surface and the distance to the tongue. If its 1/8 of an inch or more you may be in luck.

- Movement And Squeaks https://en.search.wordpress.com/?src=organic&q=Georgia -

Old fir flooring are also a lot more prone to motion and squeaks than other styles of hardwood floors. That is because of the way they were set up and the fasteners used. Back then, screws were not used for holding straight down the sub-ground, or ship lap as it is called under these kind of floors. The ship lap was mounted on the joists with nails. (If your home is old enough they may even be square headed fingernails.) The tongue and groove fir flooring was then blind nailed to the ship lap.

Over the years, through many winters and summers, your house has settled and the floor has settled and moved along with it. Specifically in high traffic areas, the fir and the ship lap will often work its method loose from the nails causing these areas to move and possibly squeak.

Movement and squeaks are normal for these beautiful vintage floors. If you have no squeaks consider yourself among the very lucky few. Wanting to repair this type of movement can be hugely pricey. It where to find flooring installation Augusta GA involves very carefully removing the prevailing flooring to expose the ship lap which then needs to be correctly screwed down. No easy, quick or cheap process. You are far better off accepting this within the character of your floors and used to it.

- Large Gaps -

Another characteristic of fir floors is they often have large gaps between your boards. This provides a lot to do with the settling and motion as described above. Because they agreement and expand over the years, the boards can slowly spread apart and leave you with space between the joints. Many refinishers trowel fill putty over the entire floor to fill these gaps just like they would for an oak ground. But this may not often be in your best interests with fir.

Because these flooring can move so much, the dried filler could have a hard time staying in place. Also the gaps between the boards will be full of dirt and residue that has gathered over the decades and this will further hinder the adhesion of the filler. Filler that becomes loose are certain to get ground into the newly finished flooring scratching it up, shortening its life and surface.

Fir also varies from board to table regarding color. Some boards will end up being very red, others a lighter brown and still others could have significant light coloured streaks in them. Because of this, no filler color will match perfectly. Always take these factors into consideration before deciding whether your floors certainly are a applicant for filling or not really.

Several older floors also need repairs because of earlier careless renovations like wall space being removed etc. Make sure that reclaimed classic fir from the same era as your floors are sourced so they match as close as possible. Unfortunately, brand-new fir looks nothing like old growth fir from years back. If you use this new flooring to patch areas in your floor, they will stand out just like a sore thumb.

So there you have it, soft solid wood, bruising, motion, squeaks and gaps are all part of the elegance, beauty and personality of these gorgeous vintage floors. In the event that you accept these characteristics for what they are, you then will like these floors just as much as we do.

Tadas Solid wood Flooring Inc. is focused on high quality restoration use all of the Naperville hardwood flooring sanding projects it requires on. We have successfully completed a huge selection of wood flooring restoration projects and have many happy customers to vouch for our top quality work.

But before you choose us or any additional business in Naperville to refinish your hardwood flooring, be sure you pop to our internet site and download and go through our FREE Consumer Report which will educate you on what questions you have to ask any hardwood ground refinishing business in Naperville before hiring them. While you're now there, take a few minutes to check out a few of our photos from function we've done for previous happy clients.