Hard wax oil: Proper application and polishing + information on prices
- General information
- ingredients
- commitment
- characteristics
- application
- preparation
- Seal floors
- More information
- repair
- equipment
- maintenance
- Prices
Hard wax oil is a means of preserving and protecting wood. It has the enormous advantage of being made of all-natural ingredients. This makes hardened wax oil very suitable for allergy sufferers or environmentally conscious persons. At the same time, it is so robust and resilient that it can withstand raging children well. Read in this text everything you need to know about hard wax oil, its processing and purchase prices.
Natural wood protection
Wood preservatives based on petroleum or plastics are certainly very effective. Unfortunately, these artificial chemical products often spread an unnatural odor. Legislation on wood preservatives is very strict today. However, allergy sufferers and sensitive persons may still suffer from the typical symptoms of today's remedies if they are exposed to the exhalations too long: headaches, respiratory complaints, poor concentration, irritability, insomnia are often due to an incompatibility with artificial-chemical wood preservatives to lead.
General information
ingredients
Tempered wax oil, on the other hand, convinces with its purely natural ingredients. Concentration and ingredients may vary depending on the manufacturer and type. Essentially , hardwax oil consists of vegetable and mineral ingredients: oil from the pressed seeds of sunflower, soy, thistle, carnuba or candelilla are typical of this.
Titanium-4-oxide is often used as mineral ingredients. For reasons of cost, this non-toxic pigment is mainly produced in the laboratory. Its harmlessness, however, has been thoroughly tested and proven. As a solvent and diluent, a small amount of ethanol is added in hardened wax oils. However, this solvent is previously carefully liberated from all benzenes and flavors. Ethanol is basically completely natural alcohol, as it occurs in wine. It flies quickly and residue-free, once the hard wax oil is applied. Other ingredients include paraffins, drying agents and additives for moisture protection.
commitment
Hard wax oil has proven to be an excellent preservative of damaged surfaces. It is so resistant that it is even suitable for floors. In fact, this is its most common use case. Tempered wax oil can also be used to handle knife handles, stained and polished furniture and interior fittings.
However, it is less suitable for countertops in kitchens or for plates for dining tables. Hardened wax oil is a "layer-forming oil with wax fractions". It has many advantages but is sensitive to point heat. Even a hot coffee mug can quickly leave a white wreath on a table top treated with hard wax oil. There are other, more resilient means that also work on a natural basis.
characteristics
Tempered wax oil is a colorless, low-viscosity preservative for open-pored wood. Depending on the absorbency of the base material, 35 to 50 cl of oil are required for one square meter. This makes its application very economical. Heavily absorbent surfaces such as cork, balsa, end grain or burnt brick need a bit more of this remedy.
After curing, it darkens the ground slightly. This essentially enhances the contrast. So even with very light wood can still achieve an interesting grain effect.
application
preparation
... for the wax oil coating
The coating of a floor with hardened wax oil is the last step. Before finishing, the floor must therefore be pretreated as well as possible. The usual steps are:
- Thoroughly clean
- sand
- Clean again
- Grind again
- fine grinding
- Final cleaning
Regardless of whether a new floor should be coated or an old floor worked up, cleanliness is always the top priority. When pre-cleaning a floor, it's all about removing all potential abrasive particles from the surface. Sand and dirt can erode deep grooves in the ground when sanding. Therefore first vacuum several times thoroughly and wipe off with a damp cloth.
After cleaning, the first cut follows. For this purpose, the commercial parquet sanding machines are particularly well. They are efficient and produce a uniform microsection. After this pre-sanding, the room is again sucked thoroughly and wiped wet.
Now work with a finer abrasive. The bumps are removed in this way. Even deeper grooves are equalized by the intermediate sanding. Then wipe with a damp cloth and let it dry.
The loose fibers of the wood are fixed by the intermediate grinding and moistening. They are cut off during fine grinding with grain size 180. What remains is a smooth, even and open-pored surface. This is once again sucked thoroughly and wiped slightly damp. This removes the sanding dust. Finally, the floor is ready for hard wax sealing.
Seal floors
Wooden floors made of native woods absorb the hardened wax oil very well. They darken slightly, but this is especially evident along the grain. A high contrast texture is a welcome side effect of this natural way of sealing wood floors. For tropical and exotic woods, treatment with hardened wax oil can have undesirable effects. These woods are partly in turn very oily. This oil can react with the wax oil and cause unsightly discoloration. That's why you should always make sure that the tropical wood tolerates the wax oil. In most tropical woods, however, trimming with dilution is sufficient as a pretreatment.
After the final sanding, the first three layers of oil are applied. They do not last very long on the surface but seep quickly into the depth of the wood pores. But they seal and harden the surface of the wood from within. Between every puncture, the layer is allowed to dry. That is why it is best to work in a room temperature of 20 degrees. A drying time between 6 to 8 hours is optimal at this temperature. The last coat must dry for 12 hours before entering the room. If now with a polishing machine the floor again rubs off completely, you get the perfect shine. It should be cleared up and, above all, covered with carpets, a wooden floor sealed with hardwax-oil should not be used until after 14 days at the earliest. In the meantime, you have to keep it scrupulously clean. For this purpose, one-way slippers have proven successful for shoes.
More information
repair
If you have done the seal correctly, later repairs are no longer a problem. The deeply penetrated oil colors the grain several millimeters deep. If it has come to scratches, they can be easily sanded out and sealed again with hard wax oil. This also shows that a careful execution only brings benefits.
equipment
In order to grow a wooden floor efficiently and effectively hard, always clean, ideally new tool should be used. For applying the oil tassel and brush are suitable. They are cheap to buy in the hardware store. A quast costs from 5 euros. It should only be used once. The 30 euros for a complete seal are certainly not too much. Microfibre cloths are ideal for cleaning the fully cured sealer. These cost in a pack of 10 from about 5 €. Microfibers absorb even the smallest dust particles and also have a final polishing effect.
maintenance
Once sealed, hard-waxed floors are quite sturdy and durable. A regular, moist care is enough. Standing water should be avoided, this can give ugly limescale. But these can also be polished well with microfiber again. In the worst case, a few drops of hard wax oil even out a discoloration.
A good, waxed wooden floor is a house a very special value. It's a lot of higher quality flooring than vinyl, laminate or carpet. A wooden floor is a natural, biological and sustainable surface, which ensures a pleasant atmosphere and a good indoor climate.
Prices
The price differences are amazingly large with this sealer. Although it is true that here too, larger containers lead to lower liter prices. However, even in the largest and most economical containers, the funds differ rapidly by 20-30%. As a guide price you can accept about 20 euros per liter. However, this seal is very productive. It is enough for 16 - 20 m².
| container | hue | shine | Manufacturer | Prices |
| 0, 25 l | transparent | - | Bondex | 11, 99 € |
| 0, 75 l | transparent | satin gloss | Clou | from 18, 49 € |
| transparent | satin gloss | Biopin | 20, 99 € | |
| transparent | satin finish | Osmo | 25, 49 € | |
| transparent | satin finish | PNZ | 22, 99 € | |
| Amber | satin gloss | Osmo | 25, 99 € | |
| Terra | satin gloss | Osmo | 25, 99 € | |
| 2, 5 l | colorless | - | Renovo | 29, 95 € |
| satin finish | Osmo | 84, 90 € | ||
| semigloss | Osmo | 77.95 € | ||
| - | PNZ | 43.18 € |
