Hardwood Floor Cleaning in Sansom Park, TX
A window unit takes about two gallons of water a day out of the air, and in a lot of Sansom Park houses some of that is landing on the floor.
Plenty of houses on the bluffs above the West Fork here were built before central air was standard, and plenty of them still run window units in a back bedroom or a converted porch. Sansom Park Addition, the Robinson-Hunter blocks, the older Yale Street stretch.
A window air conditioner is a dehumidifier that happens to also cool. On a humid August day a single unit pulls a remarkable amount of liquid water out of the room air, and all of that water has to go somewhere.
Where the Condensate Actually Ends Up
By design, into a pan and out the back through a slinger ring, which throws it against the condenser coil to evaporate. That works when the unit is tilted correctly and the drain path is clear. When the unit is level or tipped slightly into the room, when the pan is rusted through, or when the drain hole is packed with dust and insect debris, water comes out the front instead. It runs down the inside wall and reaches the floor at the baseboard, usually behind a curtain or a piece of furniture, which is why nobody catches it in June and everybody finds it in September.
The Damage Is Quiet and It Is Always in One Spot
Directly below the unit and running a foot or two out from the wall. It happens a few ounces at a time over an entire summer, which is exactly the pattern that does the most harm, because the wood never gets a chance to dry between wettings. What you get is a darkened patch, board edges that have swelled and stayed swollen, and eventually black staining where iron from a fastener has reacted with the tannin in the wood.
What Comes Off and What Is Already Done
Surface darkening in the coating comes up with the rest of the film. Cupping and swelling in the board are dimensional changes in the wood and cleaning does not reverse them. Black staining is inside the timber. Neither of those last two is something a cleaning company can touch, since putting them right means cutting the boards down or taking them out, and that is carpentry and refinishing work that we do not take on. The boards under the window may need somebody else. The rest of the room does not.
Not sure whether your floor needs cleaning or refinishing? There are three tests you can run yourself in about a minute, and they will tell you which one you are dealing with before anyone quotes you.
Hardwood problems we handle in Sansom Park
Check the tilt on the unit, then let us take the summer off the rest of the room.
Sansom Park schedules on 214-838-7852 or through the site, and $50 comes off the first visit.
Areas we cover around Sansom Park
Neighborhoods: Sansom Park Addition, Robinson-Hunter, Marion Sansom Park, Roberts Cut Off corridor, Yale Street area, Jacksboro Highway corridor, West Fork Trinity bluffs
Zip codes: 76114, 76106
Hardwood questions from Sansom Park homeowners
How do we stop it before next summer?
Check the tilt with a level, so the outside edge sits slightly lower. Clear the drain hole in the pan. And put a purpose-made drip tray under the unit inside if the wall is already showing marks. Ten minutes in April is worth more than anything done in September.
There is a mark but the floor feels flat and solid. Any hope?
Good chance, yes. If it never got past the finish you are looking at a cleaning job. The technician can usually tell by how sharply defined the edge of the mark is.
Is a portable unit better for the floor?
Not necessarily. Portables drain into a tank or a hose that somebody has to manage, and a full tank overflowing onto wood is a common way this exact problem happens without a window being involved.
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Schedule your Sansom Park hardwood floor cleaning
Prefer to talk it through first? Call 214-838-7852. Otherwise, pick a time below.
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