How to maintain your timber floor. Real Timber.

How to maintain your timber floor. Real Timber.

Real Timber is a superb floor. It can have either a commercial grade finish, [Toby, Bona, Polycure or Osmo] or else a light home finish. If your floor coating is heavy duty it will still require maintenance though not as heavily as the commercial finishes listed earlier. With lighter weight finishes you should have a very strict maintenance routine. In general though a routine should be as follows.

Never flood a timber floor with water. Coatings are very good but timber may still be affected by water.


Weekly
Keep dust and grit to a minimum using a soft broom or brush. Sand has remarkable cutting ability underfoot so the less sand the better.

As needed
Lightly mist the area with a fully diluted solution of VCS Timber Floor Cleaner. Use a soft mop to dry the area streak free.

Entries
Make sure that mats are placed at entries to remove sand from people's feet as they enter the home - location.

Basics common to all floors.

1 Grit, dust & sand should be kept to an absolute minimum. It will be necessary to sweep the floor regularly to maintain a grit free environment. Grit or sand that is crushed under a leather soled shoe for example will abrade the surface of the floor. Keep it to a minimum.

2 It is a good idea to use a vacuum cleaner however you should note that some of the bristles on the heads of commercial and domestic vacuum cleaners can be quite stiff and can even scratch a polyurethane surface. You must ensure that the bristles used on the brush head are appropriate for use with a timber floor. Very often this information is not available in the place where vacuum cleaners are purchased and you may need to seek additional information from the distributor or manufacturer.

3 Additional maintenance steps include the use of a damp mop. You should never flood a timber floor with water assuming that the sealer used on the surface is waterproof. In the majority of cases polyurethane sealers are not waterproof. Therefore a well wrung out mop is essential, keeping the water used to an absolute minimum.
With oiled floors the surface is waterproof but the same rules apply. Excessive water can result in a blotchy surface. Water should always be kept to a minimum.

4 When it comes to the question of what to use in the water to maintain the timber floor the simple guideline is that this should be a "non-residual cleanser" or a product that will not leave a residue behind on the floor. For example, some cleaning products contain soap and it is quite easy to leave a slightly sticky surface behind on the floor. If this occurs then grit will be trapped on the surface making it difficult to maintain the area using a sweeping brush or vacuum cleaner. Some cleaning contractors have reported that when using some materials the floor seems to get dirty more quickly and the common cause is the use of something residual in the water. Purpose made non-residual timber floor cleaning fluids are very effective and are usually an economical choice. Some are supplied in concentrated form which means that there are also suitable for use in removing scuff marks which are generally harder to remove than the usual small markings.