sanding and sealing tips

Sanding and Sealing tips

After you have finished laying your parquet floor blocks start by using a 50 grit sand paper and work diagonally across the floor with the grain of the floor. If you are sanding a old floor then use a lower grit of 36 you can go all ways over the floor when taking off old lacquer but always finish by going with the grain diagonally across the floor . Once you have finished going over the floor once with a 50 grit go round the edges with the edger in 50 grit. Then repeat go round the edges working up the grits 50 then 80 then last of all 100. Then go all over the floor with a 80 grit on the big belt sander then repeat once over with a 100 grit always diagonally across the floor switching witch diagonal to take each time .so once one way then up a grit and go diagonally the other. Once you have the whole floor up to 100 grit then fill. Mix up resin filler with the sanding dust out of the edger it is a finer dust. Then with a filling knife fill the whole floor making sure you push the filler down the cracks "the more the merrier". Preferable leave to dry over night or three to four hours. Finish the floor with a final sand of 120 grit making sure all filler is removed and sanding with the grain diagonally. Clean the floor when finished with a hover, clean all skirtings and window ledges making sure all dust is up leave about half an hour for dust to settle then tack the whole floor with tack cloth or wet cloth. Now ready for finishing i recomend a water base lacquer like bona mega or simular or for high traffic areas bona traffic or simular. Start by applying lacquer to the edges with a brush then on to rolling out the lacquer with a roller on a pole, use a short mole haired roller and spread the laquer consistently. Don't leave any big puddles of lacquer as this will show and take longer to dry . Cover the whole floor and leave to dry for about two hours then repeat and cover floor again using same process and leave over night. In the morning the laquer should be dry and ready for a light sand preferably with a screen machine or a fine sand by hand 150 grit or higher. Hover clean and wipe with tack cloth or wet cloth. Then on to final coat repeat as before making sure this time you are perfect as this will not be sanded back . " voila"you are finished preferably leave over night and thats it thanks for reading if you're interested in having a parquet floor check out are website link above.

Installing Parquet Flooring

First thing to consider is sub floor preparation. The flatter the the floor the less chance of gaps and obviosly the flatter the finished floor will be. Concrete floors can be leveled with self leveling screed like stop gap 3oo or ply for wooden floors. All floors should be tested for moisture and moisture should be lover than 4 %. Mark out the border with a chalk line always allow for exspansion gap of 12mm and block border including inlay. Then glue out and lay parquet floor blocks, always lay out a spine first consisting of two rows of blocks going down the length of the room make sure these are presion laid . Then allow a few hours to dry please mark sure these are striaght. Always glue out to chalk line but lay blocks over the line ready for being cut. After you have finished laying blocks leave to dry . Then mark out exactly where border is going and cut out with a festool skill saw or normal skill saw . Festool saw is reccomend as it doesn't chip blocks, then glue out and lay border. Thats it for laying the floor onto finishing, only thing i will say is if laying new floor use a polymer adhesive like silka or if it is a old floor then use a bicthem glue like f21 it will react with the old bitchem.