Any time your home encounters water damage, whether it’s from a natural disaster, leaky pipe, or other cause, the floor is bound to get wet. Even if the water damage is minimal and rest of the home manages to stay free from moisture, it’s important to make sure that your floors are properly cleaned and restored. Leaving your floors to air dry is an invitation for mold that can have damaging effects.
Restoring Carpeted Floors
Restoring carpeted floors may require different steps depending on the amount of time that the water sets in the carpet and the amount of water that saturates the carpet. If the carpets become completely saturated and set for a long period of time, it might be best to pull up the carpet and padding and replace it.
If the water is removed quickly, it may be possible to salvage the carpet. The padding should generally be replaced any time it soaks up moisture, but it may be possible to save the carpet by vacuuming the water out with a wet vacuum and using high powered fans to dry it out completely. After drying the carpet, it should cleaned thoroughly, and replaced if there are any signs of mold.
Restoring Laminate Flooring
Laminate flooring stands up well to a small spill, but not to any amount of flooding. After water damage has occurred, it’s usually best to simply replace the laminate flooring than to try to repair it. Underlayment should also be removed and replaced to prevent mold growth. Laminate flooring is not only a breeding ground for mold when wet, it will also warp and change in appearance.
Restoring Hardwood Flooring
Hardwood flooring can be painful to remove and replace because of the cost that generally goes into installing the flooring in the first place. However, it can be tough to tell whether hardwood floors can be salvaged. In some cases, moisture can seep below hardwood floors in as little as 24 hours and cause unseen mold to grow.
Its important to completely dry both hardwood and the sub-floor after water damage has occurred. It can be difficult to do so without special equipment and it can be tough to tell whether the floor has been completely dried after clean-up. For best results, it’s recommended to call in floor restoration specialists to help you clean and salvage your hardwood floors.
Restoring Tile Floors
Ceramic tile floors generally stand up the best to water damage. If the floors are properly installed, the water usually can’t seep through to the sub-floor. To determine whether this is the case, it may be prudent to remove a tile or two and inspect the sub-floor. Alternatively, floor restoration professionals may be able to check the sub-floor without removing any tiles.
If water has damaged your home, calling floor restoration professionals may help you to save your flooring and money while protecting your family from harmful mold.
One of the main things to always remember, letting water sit or dwell in any materials that normally does not encounter water or has a high porosity or transpiration rate can create problems down the road. One of the reasons you do not see much (yes there are some) hardwood floors in basements, is the transpiration of the concrete. This creates issues for hardwood floors as well as sheet vinyl or other flooring materials that have some type of vapor barrier in its assembly. Special installations and precautions are required to accommodate the placement of certain flooring in a basement setting. Accommodations may also be needed depending on your geographic location and climate type. In basements, when deciding on a flooring type, it is always preferred to speak with the sales rep. or better yet a manufacture’s representative.
