Installing hardwood flooring yourself is the easiest way to get trendy flooring in your home without spending tons of money. You can even install heated floor systems for your bathroom or eco-chic bamboo floors. The possibilities are endless with hardwood floors. Hardwood floors are significantly easier to clean, and they can give your home a new feel without changing too much.
There are dozens of types of hardwood to chose from. Each choice will have different pricing and aesthetic benefits. Here are four tips to help you renovate your floors quickly and painlessly.
Prepare Your Floor
You will need to install fold and lock flooring first. You should also leave a small gap between the wall. You can fill it in later, but that gap is important while preparing. Hardwood flooring actually needs to acclimate to your home. It’s natural. It does need to adapt.
If you do not let it the wood acclimate to the room, then the pieces will be prone to expanding too much and damaging your walls or popping out of the floor base. This is one of the biggest mistakes that people make when they put in wood floors. They avoid letting the wood adjust because they are impatient. Be patient. Let the wood adjust. It takes about two weeks for it to expand completely and be ready for installation.
Level And Protect
Make sure your floor is level. A properly leveled floor is important to prevent cracking and damages. Self-leveling liquid is a great way to easily level your floor if needed. You will need to place roofing felt after the floor is leveled. This will protect the sub floor from getting any damages caused by water. If you want to take an extra step, you can buy special treatments to protect the sub floor in addition to the roofing felt.
Lay The Composite Flooring
Composite flooring is a base between the wood and the roofing felt. Most systems lock together easily. This step is fairly simple and the fastest part of the project. Make sure you stagger the boards so that they eventually line up properly.
Finish
You can now place your beautiful wooden floors. Staggering them as you go will provide the best result and the perfect fit. Your floor should be secure and set in place. You are ready to go after this point. You may want to treat the wood with a special wax before putting in furniture. Wax will prevent scratches, damages and keep the floor shiny. Wax treatments every year will keep your floor protected and beautiful.
These tips will help you get the best floor you can. It does take time and patience to place the flooring properly. Don’t be surprised if it takes longer than you think it will. Installing hardwood flooring in your entire home will take several weekends, and it will take a lot of rearranging of your home to do it. The end result is well worth all of the hard work.
image source: Wood Floor by webhamster, on Flickr
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Thanks for the tips. Ill have to check out some waxes to use on my floor.
Before installing hardwood floors make sure that the sub floors is adequate, well leveled and dry. The humidity level is the sub floors must not exceeded 12%.
I had no idea that hardwood floors needed time to acclimate to you room. I probably would have just put the flooring right next to the wall, only to have it pop out later. If I ever do end up installing hardwood floors, I’ll be sure to let them acclimate for a couple of weeks first. Thanks for the information!