New Port Ritchey hard wood floor company educates home owners on important things they should know about when choosing the best hard wood floors for them.
Royal Wood Floors specializes in hard wood floor refinishing and installing hard wood floors in the greater New Port Ritchey area and has been highly successful for over 15 years. “After servicing or installing a new floor, we make a point of providing the following as a special series of tips for every customer in order to ensure that their floors are protected and provide that stunning hard wood beauty for as long as possible”, says Keith Allman who owns Royal Wood Floors. He continues to say, “there are a variety of problems that can affect the beauty and life of hard wood floors and once these are isolated they can be handled properly so that the hard wood lasts for years the way it should”. “We feel that by educating the home owner they can be better equipped to tackle a project themselves or will know what to ask and expect when working with professionals”, he ends.
Which Wood Floor to Go With?
Sometimes a wood flooring contractor will sense that the customers flooring choice is not going to work, so they need to explain why and offer alternatives. This is where your knowledge of the available products and applications come into play.
You know that you want a new hardwood floor. A professional wood flooring contractor knows wood flooring. It’s up to them to walk you through the hundreds of choices that are at your feet. The more education you have, the more confidence you will have. Take the time to education yourself on the multitude of choices available and your potential to have a beautiful and long lasting hardwood floor will increase.
The floors pattern is important. The options: Strip (usually in the standard 2 ¼ – inch width), Plank (usually in between 3 and 7 inches) and Parquet, which presents an endless choice of geometric designs. Many floors use the strip product, but many homeowners opt for plank or parquet for particular reasons. If plank is chosen, the next question needs to be: Do you want square edges or V-joints (bevels) on the face? There are differences and advantages that the wood flooring professionals should be able to explain to you. For example, square-edged flooring in, say, the kitchen makes for easier cleaning. However, wider square-edged planks may should cupping. Thus, in certain environments, it’s best to go with beveled edges with wider planks. With parquet, you need to understand how the scale of the pattern related to the insulation area. Now Parquet patterns can make a room feel grand and formal, but too many repeats of the pattern may make the room seem to busy. When you are considering a particular parquet pattern, you should take your time. You should be shown a picture of how the pattern works as it repeats itself through a room. Another option, might be, that you want to customize the installation with a border or medallion or other decorative inset in the center of the room.
Now comes the species choice. You may want to go with a domestic wood, or an “exotic” imported wood. If you want oak, this constitutes more than 80% of wood flooring in America these days. If you want a species other than oak, then you want to look at these four factors: a woods appearance, cost, hardness and stability. All the better if you can be shown samples of various woods as you are trying to make a decision about them. If you want some time to consider the species options, you might want to get a copy of “Wood Species Used in Wood Flooring”. This can be obtained by contacting the National Wood Flooring Association. Cost may be the biggest consideration. Very few woods are less expensive then oak. But if the circumstances suggest, it might be smart to look at the qualities of hardness in high traffic areas so that you don’t pick out a softer wood species.
You might want to think about stability if you are in a region where seasonal humidity swings because this could cause movement in the floors. Some species are more dimensionally stable then others and therefore less susceptible to movement as a result of humidity changes. We will continue to help educate you on hard wood flooring in future articles we release.
“The best way to make sure that your hard wood floors are protected and as beautiful as they naturally can be, is to always do the research first or seek professional help. Then problems such as the ones described here can be prevented,” says Allman.
For more information about this experienced and professional hardwood floor restoration and new installation company, or to schedule repairs by these wood floor refinishing contractors, or learn about custom wood styles or the company’s inlay and medallion installation services, phone Keith Allman at 727-267-2617.
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