Hardwood Floors in Portland, Oregon

Westmoreland fir floor and staircase restoration

Scott Avery — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 01:30:23 +0000

Here’s a quick video of a wood floor and staircase that we fixed up in Westmoreland.

Craigslist, what you ought to know

Scott Avery — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 03:02:58 +0000

I was cruising Craigslist because I am interested to see how that side of the contracting market is doing. I know it may surprise you, but pretty much every contractor on there has some trick up their sleeve regarding the law. For example, I know someone personally who advertises on Craigslist, has a CCB license that is exempt status (no employees and no workers comp policy), but uses employees daily to do his jobs.

On the next ad I read, the person listed a CCB number (193569) but no company name. After looking up the number I recognized the name because this contractor ruined a job that the acquaintance I mentioned previously had to fix. You can’t learn that from Craigslist though, but it should make you scratch your head that they won’t offer a company name.

Finally, I saw the following and had to post a picture to illustrate just how shady the contractors are.

So then like the ad says, you check the www.oregon.gov/ccb website and here is what you get

People wonder why legitimate companies are always the high bidder or are more expensive. In turn I say (as a law abiding company owner) shouldn’t homeowners question why some contractors are so much lower?

Adding hardwood to an existing hardwood floor

Scott Avery — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 21:15:25 +0000

Here is a video of our latest project. We added hardwood flooring to an existing floor by lacing everything in and sanding and finishing the floor.

Thanks for great homeowners

Scott Avery — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 19:28:29 +0000

We really appreciate when our customers provide a good review. We screen shot this off Angie’s List and left out the client info for confidentiality.

Evaluating refinishing estimates

Scott Avery — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 22:49:28 +0000

A measurable difference

Scott Avery — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 16:11:07 +0000

Someone asked me again today during an estimate how many years I’ve been in the business and how many years each of the employees have been in the business.

I’ve stated this before, but your knowledge is not different in 20 years versus 10 years if you never try to educate yourself. You will be the same person with the same set of skills.

I just got my renewed certification licenses in the mail today and wanted to take a minute to highlight what that means:

In order to earn these credentials, I had to:

Be an NWFA member in the business for at least two years.

Pass a visual inspection of how to sand, finish, and install a hardwood floor by an instructor.

Take a timed test online that tested my knowledge.

I’m not writing this to gloat, but to suggest that measuring a person’s skill level simply by the number of years in the business is like judging a book by its cover. The standards that measure my certifications were set by the people who wrote the guidebook worldwide for wood floors. Wherever you live, it’s worth to ask the contractor if they any credentials besides time in business.

Cure time, dry time, when to move back home

Scott Avery — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 21:54:14 +0000

A frequent discussion I have during estimates is regarding when people can have their home back. When can they walk on the floor? When can they put back area rugs? I’ll dive into this as best as possible.

Cure time- A finish is technically cured when 100% of the solvents have left the coating. This is quite variable between the types of finishes. A general rule follows:

Waterborne finishes-(7-10 days)
Oil modified polyurethane- (30 days)
Conversion varnish-(30-60 days)

Keep in mind that the cure time is not a good measure for judging when the floor is durable enough to move back into the home. The cure time of a finish simply is a measure of when the floor will no longer emit a smell and will have achieved the best optical clarity.

Dry Time-This is a pretty simple term. When the finish no longer sticks to your feet when you walk across the floor, it is dry. Most finishes dry within 3-12 hours per coat.

Despite mass marketing by certain companies, I don’t encourage any homeowner to be present during the application of floor finish whether it is low VOC or solvent based. VOC(Volatile Organic Compund) is one way to measure the toxicity of a floor, but some components of toxicity may not be able to be measured using VOC because they may not be airborne (i.e. volatile)such as iso cyanate, the chemical hardener in waterborne finishes. In addition, Acetone (think nail polish remover) is one chemical with VOC that is exempt from measurement. In the end, don’t become a victim of marketing, all finishes have a degree of toxicity until they dry and the air in your house clears.

My general rules for returning to your house for most finishes:

Allow 24 hours following the application of a final coat until you return and walk on the floor
Allow one week until you put down area rugs.
Replace the felt on your moving furniture and allow 2-3 days before using chairs that move or slide.

I hope that this helps explain the practical side of having your floors refinished.

Fixing time’s impact

Scott Avery — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 01:37:55 +0000

We have been working on a floor in the Laurelhurst neighborhood and restoring it back to it’s original state. One issue we’ve noticed is that the time effects of the floor being ambered from finish for so long has created a dilemma. The original feature strip stood out in color and over time has faded to match the original flooring.

To fix this problem, we taped off the area and applied a tinted sealer to pronounce the color.

The impact is pretty amazing and should last for a long time until the next refinish when the color will need to be re-applied.

Green Blog : Evaluating Production Sources

Scott Avery — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 20:58:13 +0000

Green Blog : Evaluating Production Sources.

Here is a great article by Elizabeth Baldwin. Elizabeth Baldwin has over 20 years of international wood sourcing experience. Very widely traveled, her résumé’s “Special Skills” section includes “the ability to eat anything from raw horse to deep-fried scorpion.” She serves as Metropolitan Hardwood Flooring’s (metrofloors.com) ECO (Environmental Compliance Officer)

Built to last

Scott Avery — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 20:20:39 +0000

I recently tiled my own kitchen and it required me to install an oak nosing at one doorway. I put the nosing in using the standard procedure we generally use (unless asked not to do so) when we install stairs and stair nosings. Why these pieces?

Because stairs and stair nosings actually extend out and slightly overhang a vertical surface such as a riser the area is usually 1″ to 1 1/2″ overhanging. When you leverage hundreds of pounds of force multiple times in the form of foot traffic, then the area can become loose and dangerous. Ask most seasoned carpenters about building for the long haul and you’ll hear the phrase “glue and screw”. Let’s investigate a little deeper.

Glues can come in many shapes sizes and I prefer PL Polyurethane adhesive because it is very tolerant of temperature and moisture swings. This is not entirely true for traditional wood glue, which can shrink as it cures, causing it to fracture over time and loose its strength.

For screws, we love the #10 trimhead screws-2 3/4″ length with threads in two different directions. These screws leave a small footprint-approx. 1/8″ in diameter. Because there are threads in two directions, it makes it impossible for the screw to back out. In fact, if you hit resistance you can turn your power driver to reverse and with additional pressure these screws will actually sink even farther into the wood.

After being screwed into an area, we will create a 1/4″ recess and apply grain-matched wood plugs. If the plug is well matched then the area with the screw will look pretty seamless in appearance.

You cannot always see what creates quality right away. But time is the greatest judge of a well built project and if value is on your mind, then I urge you to weight longevity greatly over bottom line pricing.