David Guntons Hardwood Floors Blog

James wrote to ask for advice about a dirty oak floor:

Hi David,
It looks from your website and the chat I had with your office as though youmight be able to help me, I certainly hope you can. I had a new oak floor laid a couple of years ago in my hall which was sealed with Danish Oil.
It looked wonderful until 9 months ago when we had some builders in and now it looks dry, dirty and as though the seal has worn right off. It could really use some TLC.
Someone has suggested using wire wool with white spirit to clean the floor and then to re-apply Danish oil. What are your thoughts? Is white spirit really a good cleaner - is there something better? Or, should I give it a light sand? I am sorry to ask, but everyone has a different opinion and I am not sure what is right…
Thanks in advance for your help.

David Gunton wrote;

Dear James,
in theory you should be able to give the floor a good scrub with soapy water to bring the dirt out and bring the natural colour back.  If that does clean it up, then leave the floor to dry properly - say at least a day - then lightly rub it down with 180 grit flour paper , vacuum off the dust and apply at least 3 coats of Danish Oil. However, if that does not do the trick of getting it clean and even coloured all over then I regret to say you are going to have to sand off and refinish. White spirit should not have any deleterious effect on two year old Danish Oil and could be good for removing oily stains and rubber heel marks. However, some oils like Osmo never com[pletely dry, so you may be washing some of it out with white spirit. However, in general terms, if you wash the floor with white spirit you are only likely to spreading the dirt more thinly over a wider area or washing it deeper into the timber. To clean a floor properly you have to mop on a liquid that melts, loosens or absorbs the dirt then convey that dirt with the mop into the mop bucket. If you merely mop over the floor with a dampened mop you are leaving the dirt on the floor. To mop a floor thoroughly with white spirit will probably give you a headache at best and cancer at worst ( white spirit is mildly carcinogenic )- and you would need a lot of white spirit.

Do not use wire wool and water. You are in danger of creating blue stain on the floor which is caused by reaction between the iron oxide - caused by the rusting action of the water - and the tannic acid in the oak. In fact, do not use wire wool. Use a bristle scrubbing brush – not a wire brush, though a copper wire brush is good for deep scrubbing of ingrained dirt and use fine sandpaper on the dry timber, as much as is possible working with the grain, not across it.

I hope this is helpful and remain,

yours truly,

David Gunton.

Trees are just like most other natural growing things.  They have an infancy during which they are very vulnerable.  They grown on to maturity and become productive, through photosynthesis, absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, but also converting the energy of the sun into useful material like leaf litter and fallen branches which are nutrition for other life forms.  At the end of their life they become aged, gradually diminishing in productivity and eventually fall into decay, to be replaced by younger trees.

Therefore, just as produce from your garden should be eaten when ripe and not left to die a natural death, trees should be felled and their timber made use of when they reach the peak of their maturity.  For every tree felled at least three should be replanted to ensure that there is a gain over the loss and that there are spares available to be lost through natural disasters like winds and disease.  In 1999 and 2007 powerfully destructive storms swept across Europe.  Estimates of the number of trees lost in those storms range around the 27,000,000 mark.   A lot of spare trees need to be planted to make up for that natural loss.

I addition to storm losses we have disease losses. It is estimated that 95% of elm trees across the Northern Hemisphere have been killed by Dutch Elm Disease.  see http://www.forestresearch.gov.uk/fr/HCOU-4U4JCL

Sudden Oak Death is another disease which has  threatening implications for our tree stock.  Over a million trees have been infected in California alone.  It is a fungal based disease which appears to spread from old decayed rhododendron.  it is a disease which affects other trees such as Beech and Douglas fir to mention but two.

 http://nature.berkeley.edu/comtf/

http://www.forestry.gov.uk/pramorum

So it is easy to see why not only should we conserve our trees but that when we do fell them, we do not waste their product. 

We are very fortunate in Britain to live on an island blessed by unequalled natural beauty enhanced by a millennium or more of decoration by beautiful architecture.  Of all of that we are not only the beneficiaries, but also the custodians.  Each of us owes a duty to posterity not just to care for our inheritance, but also to add to that store of beauty in whatever ways we can, be they ever so little.  The wide board floors we create under the commissions of our clients are extraordinary creations, the like of which have never been seen or created in Britain before. They follow a tradition dating back to medieval times of stout English Oak boards, hand worked from the log to create floors which will last for centuries.  Today we are able to cut, dry and handle boards which would have been impractical for our forbears, so we are able to make floors of a character they could only have dreamed of.  There is no doubt that these floors will be cherished by successive generations, so will be part of an enduring Legacy to the future.  They transform rooms and homes and are a constant joy, loved and enjoyed by their owners, family and friends. They improve with each passing year especially if treated with care and affection.  If neglected, through restoration they recover to a new glory exhibiting battle scars with pride.

In making these types of floor we waste as little of natures bounty as possible.  We use the full length of the log.  We use the full width of each board cut from it. We only cut off the sapwood.  We even produce coned boards which following the trees natural shape, are wider at one end than the other.  Gnerally these boards are made up in matched pairs or threes so that when laid together they return their long sides to the parallel.  We have a commission in Australia to make floors in rooms wider at one end than the other from boards up to and over a metre wide and nearly 9 metres long in single pieces of English Oak.  In Sussex we are to make a floor in boards 6 metres long which radiate around the curves of a room built in an arc.  These floors will be made from coned boards.