How to maintain your finish
This maintenance guide is appropriate for the following floor types:
- Penetrating or buffing oil finish such as Synteko Natural Oil or Domo
General Points
Regular or daily maintenance will maintain the beauty of your timber floor. This requires little more than sweeping with a soft bristle broom, or vacuuming with a soft floor attachment. Detailed maintenance for your oiled floor is listed below.
| Synteko recommends the following timeline to ensure proper curing: | |
| Walk on floors after | 24 hours |
| Replacing furniture on floors | 2-3 days |
| Coverings on floor | 1-2 weeks |
| Washing floor | 6-8 weeks |
Treating you newly oiled floor finish with a little love and care in the early stages will minimize premature marking such as water marks. Ventilating the floor areas immediately after the floor coating has been applied will facilitate curing of the oils as they are natural products.
Below is a list of general steps that can be taken to prolong the life of the timber floor finish with minimal effort.
- Every floor must be dust mopped as often as possible to remove grit and dust from the surface. Walking on dusty or dirty floors is the fastest way to damage a floor finish.
- Use Glitsa’s untreated mop with Dust Pad on your floor regularly. This will keep the sand and grit off of your floor that may cause premature wear.
- Place walk off mats in entry ways and near sink areas to trap the amount of dirt and water that comes in contact with your floor
- Do not use sheet vinyl, acrylic waxes seals or tile floor care products on your oiled timber floor.
- Use throw rugs inside doorways to help prevent grit, dirt and other debris from being tracked onto your timber floors. This will prevent wear and tear.
- Do not wet-mop your timber floor. Standing water will leave a discolouring residue and result in white spotting. Wipe up spills immediately with a dry towel.
- Do not wash your newly oiled floor for approximately six to eight weeks, allowing ample time for the floor finish to cure and harden.
- Fit Safeglides felt floor protector pads under the legs of furniture to prevent scuffing and scratching.
- Avoid walking on your wood floors with cleats, sports shoes and high heels. A 60kg woman walking in high heels has an impact of 900kg sq. cm. An exposed heel nail can exert up to 3,500kg sq. cm. This kind of impact can dent any floor surface.
- When moving furniture, do not slide or drag any item on your timber floor. It is best to pick up the furniture to protect the wooden floor surface.
- For timber flooring in the kitchen, place an area rug in front of the kitchen sink.
- Use a humidifier throughout the winter months to keep wood movement and shrinkage to a minimum.
- Avoid placing rugs on finished surfaces for seven days.
Preventive Maintenance
Preventive Maintenance may be the most important factor in determining the longevity of your wood floor finish.
- Check your chair legs and other pieces of furniture and attach Safeglides Felt Floor protectors to all furniture that will come in contact with your wood floor.
- Keep high heel shoes in good repair. Heels that have lost their protective cap can cause little indentations in any floor surface, even concrete!
- Keep pet claws trimmed.
- Do not over-water plants. Soil, fertilizers, and plant foods may have chemicals in them that could damage your oiled floor finish.
- Soft rubber (shoe soles, toy wheels, etc.) will leave marks on the floor. Most of these marks can be rubbed out, but should be avoided if possible.
Detailed maintenance
Please remember that Synteko Natural or Domo are penetrating oil’s that soak into the wood fibres hardening in the grain of the timber to form a protective penetrating seal and not a surface film coating.
New Floors
Assuming that the floor has been handed over after finishing the timber surface in Synteko Natural/Domo oil. The floor can be used for light traffic after oil has cured for 24-48 hours. Avoid dirt for the first week and water spillage for the first six – eight weeks to minimise white spotting. As a precaution always wipe up water/liquid spills immediately.
Daily maintenance
Once a day or as often as possible the entire area should be swept with an electrostatic sweep mop. The removal of dust and grit from the floor is an important part of good floor maintenance. It is important that the dust control mop is kept clean. When necessary spot mop any spillage with 1:20 dilution of Synteko Soap in warm water, using a well wrung cloth.
Weekly Maintenance
Once a week, dry-damp mop (not soaking wet mop) the floor with Synteko Soap diluted with warm water 1:20 and allowed to dry thoroughly. Ensure the applicator or mop is clean and not used for any other purpose. After use, rinse the mop thoroughly in clean water. If necessary, only for badly worn surfaces, treat with Synteko Recover.
Monthly Maintenance
Periodically the floor should be cleaned using a dry damp mop with Synteko Remover in a dilution of warm water 1:50, and allowed to completely dry and then recoated with Synteko Recover buffed in with a polishing machine using a red pad (new, non-saturated cloths will always absorb a reasonable amount of oil). Let the surface dry for 20 minutes and polish with a dry, non-flocculent cloth or white pad. On heavy traffic areas, it may be necessary to apply extra Recover 1620. Buff with a clean white pad whereby footprints are removed and surface is restored.
On especially dirty floors, use buffing machine and brown pad. Use as little water as possible, and wipe dry the floor immediately with a clean cloth. Wait until the floor is completely dry before polishing or treating with Synteko Recover 1620. If the floor looks grey polishing with Synteko Natural/Domo (1608/1619) or Synteko Recover 1620 is necessary.
The maintenance and frequency of the above steps, especially the latter, will depend on the traffic and dirt build-up of the floor, but can be reduced gradually from once a month to once every three or four months.
Warning
During maintenance procedures operator to carry out all work using safe work practices to ensure safety of public and property at all times. Area to be maintained, to be cordoned off from public and only re-used once surface is dry. All rags and pads to be soaked in water immediately after use to avoid risk of materials self-igniting.