If you have wood floors in your house or even a business, resurfacing is one of the most common ways to revitalize them. What makes it a good choice to resurface hardwood floors, though? Anyone who's dealing with these four situations should consider whether resurfacing is the best option.
Deep Surface Damage
Generally, the best candidates for resurfacing are floors that have deep surface damage that may extend to the wood. Your alternatives are refinishing the floors, a process that entails removing the protective coating. It doesn't count as resurfacing until you sand the floor. Someone might do this if there's a deep gouge that got into the wood from something like a piece of metal from a bed digging into it during moving.
Notably, you'll still have to refinish the floors after resurfacing. Sanding down the boards means all the protective coating will be gone and you'll want to get a good layer down.
Not Too Much Resurfacing
Whenever you resurface wood floors, you're reducing the amount of material that's left. You can make up for this a bit by using a deeper protecting coating. However, repeatedly resurfacing the boards will begin to compromise the strength. In other words, you don't want to resurface hardwood floors every year unless you're dealing with huge amounts of wear and tear that justify it. Also, if that's the case, you can expect to replace the floors sooner rather than later.
Uneven
Another reason to resurface wood floors is to fix unevenness. Over time, the boards will get a little wavy due to humidity warping them. Likewise, running wheels across them all the time can wear shallow but wide grooves into the boards. High levels of foot traffic can also cause waves in the wood if people repeatedly follow the same paths across the floor.
Resurfacing will take the peaks out of those waves. The net effect is an even surface. However, you should be aware that resurfacing a floor with deep grooves may require taking a significant fraction of the material out. That will shorten the life of the boards because they won't be as strong.
Diminished Color
While modern coatings provide strong protection against things like UV rays and humidity, nothing is a permanent solution. Over time, the stain in the wood may change color or fade. When this happens, the only way to access the wood so you can restain it is by resurfacing it. The depth of the original staining will determine how deep resurfacing contractor will have to go.
For more information about how to resurface hardwood floors, contact a local company.