Basic Hardwood Floor Repair

Feb 2
10:27

2008

Niv Orlian

Niv Orlian

  • Share this article on Facebook
  • Share this article on Twitter
  • Share this article on Linkedin

In spite of the guarantees you see in the store about how many decades a hardwood floor should last, they seldom last anywhere near that long. There are so many ways in which a hardwood floor can become damaged that it is common for owners to begin repairing hardwood floor boards at some point during the first two decades.

mediaimage
It isn't that hardwood floor repair becomes necessary after so few years because of a flaw in the wood itself. It is just that a floor is something you use regularly. You have people with all sorts of debris passing through the rooms. You have days when you decide to move the furniture. If you kept it cordoned off with ropes in an environmentally controlled room,Basic Hardwood Floor Repair Articles you would never have to learn how to repair it.Basic hardwood floor repair skills are necessary because it is not cost effective to replace a floor each time it gets dinged up in various places. When you are trying to fix scratches from a dog chasing your cat through the room or a divot from dropping the desk as you passed through the room, it just makes a lot more sense to do some basic repair.Hardwood floor repair begins when you go after each blemish on a case by case basis, finding the best repair method for each blemish. Here are a few ideas to throw into your mental hardwood repair kit:-Floor Scratches - check your local hardware store for some color putty and instructions on how to apply it. Roughly, this process is just cleaning the hardwood floor and then applying a color putty stick to the damaged area.-Deep Floor Scratches - these gouges in your floor will require wood filler matched to your hard floor color tones.-Gaps Between Boards - you floor will naturally shift over time, particularly if you do not have a firm foundation under your house. Most minor gaps should be ignored, but when they become major you'll need a special gap removal tool.-Buckling Boards - this is the opposite of gaps. Your floor boards will buckle when they are pushed together, exist at high humidity, or receive severe water damage. As the floor boards have nowhere to go but up, dangerous tripping areas will be created. You need a heavy, complete flat weight to place on these buckling boards for a few days to make them even again.Tackle each problem on a case by case basis and you'll be able to restore your hardwood floor without spending all that much money.