Posts Tagged ‘hardwood floor contractor’

Carpet Cleaning Companies that are also floor refinishers? Really?

Thursday, February 23rd, 2012

I was cruising around the Linked In group for my industry trade magazine. Interestingly I saw an ad for someone selling franchise opportunities for “The Revolutionary Wood Renewal” business. I looked further into the credentials of the person in charge for selling someone a franchise. The individual works for Harris Research. It turns out that Harris Research also owns Chem Dry carpet cleaning company.

Carpet cleaning wasn’t enough for these guys so they figured, why not become wood floor and cabinet refinishers? We’ll market as “non-toxic, dustless, and 1-2 day process”. I’m going to stop there and let readers think for themselves because this is where I begin to get frustrated with people being in my industry that sheerly want profit before ethic.

To top it off, the manager of franchise sales for this company was in mobile phone sales and then dental implant sales previously. So when did he become a floor and cabinet refinishing expert? Seth Godin says that marketers should be responsible for the quality of product that a company produces. I agree. If more companies had to actually use or be the recipient of services that they provide, in comparison to highly skilled boutique companies that make better products I think they would then see what charlatans they really are.

Thinking of calling Nhance and calling Modern Tech Floors to “bid” us against each other? Please save yourself the time and just call a real contractor instead of a franchise that has absolutely NO technical background in wood floor refinishing.

BTW I’ve taken the liberty of including a link to a related company that makes all these claims of making beat up floors look perfect without sanding and all of the complaints against them.

http://www.ripoffreport.com/directory/Mr-Sandless.aspx

Here’s a video where we recently fixed a project done by a similar business.

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Westmoreland fir floor and staircase restoration

Monday, January 30th, 2012

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

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Adding hardwood to an existing hardwood floor

Tuesday, January 17th, 2012

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.

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Thanks for great homeowners

Thursday, December 15th, 2011

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.


 

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A measurable difference

Friday, November 11th, 2011

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.

 

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Built to last

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

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.

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A world tour…All in the name of better a floor

Monday, August 1st, 2011

Recently I had the opportunity to visit Fraunzimmern, Germany for a Lagler PST (Professional Sanding Training) July 22-27th. Lagler is a company located in Fraunzimmern that makes the world’s best floor sanding machines. The factory is state of the art and Lagler has decided to extend their tradition of quality beyond manufacturing and train selected professionals on technique as well.

Only ten people were selected for the trip from the United States. The tour included one day of a factory tour/machine maintenance.  State of the art machinery used in production enables Lagler to maintain a consistency of product far beyond all other manufacturers in the industry. Following the factory tour all professionals on the trip were trained on even the finest details regarding proper machine maintenance and operating specifications.

It is important to consider that reproducible quality and workmanship is most likely when machines are running optimally. The other component of producing quality floors resides within efficient and reproducible methods of sanding. Lagler has spent the last ten years in conjunction with various engineers validating their methods for producing floors that are flat and free of error. The students at the July training were all taught and judged on performance afterwards by competing teams.

Beyond the technical aspects of the trip I was really impressed by the dynamics of our group of contractors on the trip. We had contractors represented from nearly every region of the United States, all with varying beliefs in method but a common bond of passion for a perfect floor. I now feel that my network of knowledge and access to the best in the business just jumped an order of magnitude because of this opportunity. I’m certain that with the knowledge from the training and the coming line of products for floor sanding from Lagler that our abilities will advance.

Thanks to Karl Lagler and Jeff Fairbanks for this opportunity. In our next related post I will discuss the real story behind dust collection and validity of endorsements for various “dustless” systems in the industry.

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A really big reason to hire a professional

Saturday, July 2nd, 2011

This e-mail just came into my inbox:

On July 1, 2011 the Construction Contractors Board (CCB) Dispute Resolution Services (DRS) program will make significant changes to its program.

For complaints filed on and after July 1, 2011, DRS will provide only mediation services. If the parties do not settle the complaint, the complainant must go to court and obtain a court judgment before DRS can send it to the contractor’s surety for payment.

This change is made necessary by the recent sharp slowdown in construction that resulted in asignificant drop in the number of licensed contractors and the fees paid to the CCB.

To adjust to this drop in revenue, the legislature made significant cutbacks in the CCB’s budget for the DRS program. This reduced budget was signed into law by the Governor.

Essentially, if you are a homeowner and you have a significant problem with your contractor, then you should prepare for a much longer and more arduous process of correcting the issue.

Please hire the best, not just the cheapest.

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What’s a dummy board?

Wednesday, May 4th, 2011

The one that didn’t pass the algebra test?

Not really. When you have a hardwood floor installed and the height of the new floor is much higher than the dishwasher, then you have to put a board in front of the dishwasher that can be easily removed for later repairs to the dishwasher. We call it a dummy board.

I made a repair recently where a contractor forgot the dummy board. Inevitably, six months later the dishwasher needed a repair and it became an emergency repair.

 

After cutting the boards to allow for clearance, we will re-install a loose board that will fix the problem. If you’re having new hardwood flooring installed in your kitchen and the feet on your dishwasher do not have clearance to go up, then you need to make sure to pay attention. Many wood floor installers do not understand the importance of this detail.

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Home Depot fools you once again!

Thursday, April 21st, 2011

What you don’t know sometimes can surprise you.

I was discussing with a distributor colleague the other day about how amazed I was with the cost of the stair treads that you can purchase at Home Depot and Lowe’s. He informed me that the treads are a veneer and not solid oak and I was blown away.

 

 

 

Take a look at the profile from the side and you will see exactly what I am talking about. The tread on the left is solid oak the one on the right is an oak veneer. My other issue is with the China factor regarding material quality and sustainability.

Regarding sustainability: Oak doesn’t grow in China so the oak veneer had to be be shipped to China for manufacturing (for cheap) and then the tread is shipped back to the US for purchase. How GREEN is that?

Regarding longevity (life-cycle analysis): The veneer tread can likely be sanded 3 times before you burn through the veneer. My other issue is that poorly glued veneer can de-laminate and who wants a staircase that is falling apart. Let’s call the tread on the right what it is… JUNK.

The cost for a high quality staircase is in the labor for installation and finishing. The treads really only represent about 20-25% of the cost on average. If we were to estimate installing a standard staircase with the veneered treads, then the savings would be about $250-300. That’s a rather paltry number considering that an average staircase starts at about $2500 and goes up from there depending on what features you want.

Please investigate your projects from all dimensions, from the contractor to the materials used for the project.

 

 

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