Floor Sanding and Wood Floor Restoration in Farnham

Wide deal boards in Farnham’s Georgian town houses sanded with a light hand, then finished in wax or oil.

QUICK QUOTATION

Floor Sanding in Farnham's Georgian Town Houses

Farnham is known for the Georgian frontages that line its older streets, and behind many of those brick facades are floors laid two centuries ago. They are usually softwood, which joiners of the period called deal, often imported Baltic pine, in boards far wider than anything a timber merchant sells now. A principal room on the first floor might have boards ten or eleven inches across, of slightly different widths, each face-nailed to the joists with square-headed cut nails. Floor sanding in Farnham houses like these is slower and more thoughtful work than sanding a modern floor, and it rewards a light touch.

We ought to say plainly where we work from. Our family business keeps its machines and reclaimed timber at Higher Poole, just outside Wellington, which is a long way west in Somerset. Surrey is not on our weekly round. Farnham sees us for projects of a size that makes the drive sensible: a town house with timber in most of its rooms, a renovation between owners, or a shop, café or restaurant floor that needs doing while the doors are shut. If your floor falls into that group, the photographs described at the bottom of this page are the place to start.

Georgian boards have quirks that change how they should be sanded. Joiners of the period planed the top face and left the underside rough, notching it where it crossed each joist so the surface sat level. Thickness can vary along a single board, and two centuries of wear leave hollows by doors and hearths. A heavy belt sander set to flatten all that will cut through to tongues and nail heads before it gets anywhere near level. Lighter machines, more passes at moderate grits and a lot of hand scraping at the edges give a floor that is clean and sound while still looking its age.

Upper floors bring one more concern. Many Georgian rooms sit above lath-and-plaster ceilings, sometimes with original cornices, and the vibration of a large drum sander working overhead can crack old plaster. General good practice is to use smaller, smoother-running machines on those floors and to keep an eye on the ceiling below. Our floor sanding page covers the sanding sequence, and the Surrey overview lists the other towns we visit. Where deal turns out to be oak, as it occasionally does in grander rooms, see restoring oak floors; most of the time it is softwood, covered by pine floor restoration.

Painted Margins, Old Coatings and Wide-Board Repairs

Very few Georgian floors in Farnham reach us untouched. Later generations laid rugs in the middle of rooms and painted or stained the exposed margins dark brown, so a border of old paint or varnish often runs round the walls. Others painted the whole floor, or laid linoleum on bitumen, or hardboard pinned down at four-inch centres. All of that has to come off cleanly before the timber underneath can be judged, and each layer brings its own problems.

Paint first. Floor paint and stain from before the 1960s may contain lead, and sanding lead paint dry turns it into a fine, toxic dust. Simple test kits will show whether lead is present. Where it is, chemical stripping or careful wet scraping are the safer routes, followed by sanding once the paint layer has gone. Dark Victorian stains are usually just stain, but they can run deep into soft pine, and a test patch tells you how much wood must come off to clear them.

Hardboard brings hundreds of pins and staples, each a hole in the boards. Bitumen from old linoleum clogs abrasive within a metre and is better softened and scraped. Neither is difficult, but both take time that should appear on the quotation rather than turning up as a surprise.

Once the floor is bare, the repairs show themselves. Wide boards split along old nail lines; plumbers have cut through them for pipes; edges have rotted where a gutter overflowed. Matching a ten-inch Georgian board with modern timber is close to impossible, because new pine is narrower, faster-grown and paler. Our reclaimed stock includes old imperial widths, and the right piece is chosen by grain, colour and thickness so the repair sits quietly; see replacing damaged floorboards. Gaps between wide boards can be large, and on a floor that still moves with the seasons thin timber slivers glued to one edge are kinder than rigid resin; more under gap filling. Creaks from cut nails that have worked loose are cured by re-fixing into the joist, as described under squeaky floorboard repairs. Scorch marks by a hearth or a dent from a dropped iron are tackled through scratch and burn repair, and the wider list of fixes is on wooden floor repairs.

Wood Floor Restoration in Farnham With Wax and Oil

The last decision in most wood floor restoration in Farnham town houses is the coating, and many owners lean towards something their Georgian builders would have recognised. On Georgian deal, wax or oil is frequently the better fit, but each has habits that owners should understand before choosing.

Paste wax, usually a blend of beeswax and carnauba, sits in the very top of the timber and on its surface. It deepens the colour, gives a soft glow when buffed and can be renewed indefinitely without sanding: a dull patch gets more wax and a buff. Its weaknesses are water and grit. A spilt glass left overnight leaves a pale ring, wet boots mark it, and a heavily waxed floor can feel slippery if too much is applied. Wax suits sitting rooms, bedrooms and studies far better than kitchens. There is one long-term point too. Wax gets into the grain, and if you later want lacquer or oil, every trace must be removed first, because new finishes will not bond over wax residue. Wood floor waxing explains application and upkeep.

Oils work differently. Traditional linseed and tung oils soak deep into the wood and harden slowly; modern hardening oils cure faster and more evenly. Hard wax oil adds a small amount of wax to a hardening oil, giving a finish that penetrates like oil and has a little more surface resistance to water and scuffs. The look is nearly that of untreated deal, and if the boards inside the drawing room door go dull, that strip alone gets a fresh coat. On pine, most oils add some amber warmth; white-tinted oils keep the timber paler. See wood floor oiling.

A safety note applies to anyone using oil at home: rags soaked in drying oils can heat up as they cure and have been known to catch fire. Spread them flat outside to dry, or put them in water in a sealed metal tin.

Lacquer still has its place in busy rooms. A good sealing coat followed by water-based lacquer gives a tougher surface with little colour change. Stains can bring old and new boards closer together, though pine takes colour unevenly, so trials go on your own boards first; see wood floor staining. For a deeper shine in a formal drawing room, polished finishes are worth discussing. The wider service is described under wood floor restoration.

Commercial Floor Sanding in Farnham: Shops, Cafés and Restaurants

A good number of Farnham’s shops, cafés and restaurants trade from old buildings, and the timber floors inside them carry some of the hardest wear in town. Commercial floor sanding in Farnham is therefore done with the blinds down. Restaurants and cafés are tackled after the evening clear-up, and shops on whichever day they close anyway. The finishes used cure fast enough for staff to walk on them the next morning. The night or nights are booked well ahead so suppliers, staff and regular customers can be told. For more on out-of-hours work for businesses, see commercial floor sanding.

A shop floor wears in obvious places: a grey path from door to till, heel marks in front of the window display, and pale scratches wherever stands are dragged across for a new season. A café floor adds spilt coffee, chair legs and daily mopping, and a restaurant adds grease from the kitchen door. In an old building the floor may also be uneven and thinner than expected, so the same restraint used in houses applies. Sanding a two-hundred-year-old shop floor perfectly flat is not the aim; making it clean, sound and properly protected is. See shop floor sanding and restaurant floor sanding.

Finish choice for commercial floors usually favours a two-component lacquer, which stands up best to heavy footfall. There is a case for hard wax oil in some small shops and cafés, though: a worn track can be cleaned and re-oiled section by section on a quiet evening without a full sand. That suits owners who are willing to keep up the maintenance and want a more natural look in an old building. It is the wrong choice for a premises where nobody will maintain the floor.

Shop owners naturally worry about stock. Each sander feeds a sealed extractor, so very little dust settles on racks or glass counters, but covering delicate goods is still wise since no method catches every particle; the dust-free floor sanding page is frank about this. Owners of listed shop premises are often cautious about who works inside them. Paperwork helps: our written method, insurance cover notes and named referees are all available. Shop floors on a busy street will want sanding to bare wood about every four to five years; a house can go roughly twice that. Periodic buffing and a fresh maintenance coat in a quiet week help a busy floor last towards the longer end of that range.

Herringbone Halls and Georgian Staircases

Not every floor in a Farnham house is Georgian deal. Halls and reception rooms remodelled in the twentieth century often have parquet, typically herringbone blocks laid on bitumen, and it is often found under carpet when a house changes hands. Parquet is very durable once it is sound, but blocks lose their grip where water has reached them or where the adhesive has dried out with age. Blocks that move have to be fixed first, because a sander rides over a loose block and digs into its edge. They are eased out, the old bitumen is cut back beneath them and they are re-laid in new adhesive. Missing blocks are made up from salvaged stock. Sanding a herringbone pattern means cutting across the grain of every other block, so the coarse passes run diagonally and the fine ones remove the cross-grain scratches before finishing. Very old black adhesive is best identified before anyone scrapes it, as some contained asbestos. Parquet floor sanding goes into this further.

The staircase in a Georgian or Regency house is often one of its best features, and the treads under a stair carpet may be pine with a painted outer string and a varnished centre strip where a runner once lay. Stair work is almost entirely by hand. Every tread gets individual attention with a scraper and small sander, risers lose their old paint and carpet tacks, and the softened profile of each nosing is followed by hand instead of being cut square. Winders and quarter landings take longest. Balusters and handrails are usually left alone unless the owner wants them refinished too. Wax on a stair tread looks lovely and is treacherous for anyone coming down in socks, so many owners wax the hall but give the treads hard wax oil or matt lacquer for a better footing. More under stair sanding.

Where a parquet hall meets a Georgian deal floor in the next room, the two will never look identical, since they are different timbers of different ages. A finish chosen to suit both, often an oil with a slight tint, helps them sit together comfortably.

Living With an Oiled or Waxed Floor, New Timber and First Steps

Most Farnham houses take between one and three working days. Wax and some oils need longer between coats than lacquer, so a traditional finish may add a little time. Once the last coat is down, light walking in socks is fine the next day. Furniture is best kept out for two or three days, with rugs left until the finish has fully hardened.

Living with wax or oil is different from living with lacquer. A waxed floor wants a soft broom or dust mop and a damp cloth only on spills; water left standing will mark it. When the shine fades, a thin coat of wax and a buff brings it back. An oiled floor can be washed with a soap made for oiled timber, and worn areas, usually in front of the sofa and at doorways, get a maintenance coat once or twice a year in a busy home. Neither likes steam mops or strong cleaners. Felt pads on furniture and a mat at each outside door help every finish. Shops and cafés benefit from an occasional machine buff and top-up coat, described under wood floor buffing.

Some Georgian houses have a back room whose original floor was swapped for concrete decades ago. Timber can go back over that slab, either fitted by us or handed over in packs to whichever builder is on the job. Junkers and Bona are among the makers whose boards we stock. New boards should settle in the room for some days before they go down. More under wooden floor installation.

For a first opinion, photograph the room from its doorway and then take a close shot of the detail that worries you, perhaps a brown painted border or a cracked board near the fireplace. Our inbox, info@ryansrestoration.co.uk, takes photos of any size. To speak to someone, the phone number is 01823 674562; we answer from eight in the morning until six at night on weekdays, and a Saturday call can be booked. Those pictures show us whether the boards look sound enough and whether the project is large enough to bring us east. When it is, we come out to survey without charge. It takes half an hour or thereabouts: we gauge what thickness the old boards have left, take moisture readings, look at airflow beneath, check for damp and examine what earlier hands have patched. Our quotation arrives afterwards on paper, broken into its separate elements, and it will not change unless the work does. The website contact form works just as well. A little further east, we also travel for floor sanding in Guildford.

Questions About Floor Sanding in Farnham

Is Farnham within your normal working area?

Not normally. Ryan’s Restoration is based near Wellington in Somerset, so Surrey is some distance away. The town sees us when there is a substantial job, typically a whole Georgian house or a shop, café or restaurant floor. A wide photo and a close-up are usually enough for us to judge.

Can wide Georgian boards be sanded without losing their character?

Yes, if the work is done lightly. Smaller machines, moderate grits and hand scraping at the edges clean the surface without forcing every hollow flat, so the wear at doorways and hearths remains. Heavy belt sanding to make an old floor level removes far more timber than it needs to and can expose tongues and nail heads.

Should I choose wax or oil for a Georgian floor?

Wax gives depth and a soft glow and can be renewed for ever, but it marks with water and needs buffing, so it suits quieter rooms. Hard wax oil is more resistant to spills and scuffs, looks almost as natural and can be patched where it wears. In kitchens and busy halls, oil or a matt lacquer is usually more practical.

Can a waxed floor be changed to lacquer later?

It can, but all the wax has to come out first. Wax works into the grain, and new lacquer or oil will not bond properly over any residue. That usually means a full sand back to clean timber. It is worth deciding carefully at the start, because switching finishes later involves more work than staying with wax.

Our floor has a painted border. Is it safe to sand?

It depends on the paint. Floor paint from before the 1960s may contain lead, and sanding it dry creates hazardous dust. A simple test kit will show whether lead is present. If it is, chemical stripping or careful wet scraping is safer, with sanding afterwards once the paint has gone. Dark stain borders without paint are usually straightforward.

Can a damaged wide board be matched?

Usually closely enough that the repair does not catch the eye. Modern timber is narrower and paler, so we use reclaimed boards from our stock in old imperial widths, chosen for grain, colour and thickness. Occasionally the best answer is to move a sound board from a cupboard or less visible spot and fit the replacement there instead.

Can a café or shop floor be done without closing?

Usually, by working overnight or on a day the premises would be shut anyway, and using a finish that cures quickly enough for staff to walk on it the next morning. Larger floors are split into sections over several nights so trade can continue in the rest of the space.

Will sanding upstairs damage the ceiling below?

Old lath-and-plaster ceilings can crack under heavy vibration, so general good practice is to use smaller, smoother-running machines on upper floors in old houses and to keep an eye on the ceiling below while work is under way. Any existing cracks are worth pointing out before the job starts so everyone knows what was there.

What happens after I send photographs?

We look at them and tell you whether the floor seems workable and whether it justifies the drive from Somerset. Where it does, a free visit is booked, after which a written quotation sets out the sanding, repairs and chosen finish line by line.