Your Wood Surfaces Need Some Attention
Maintaining a hardwood floor in prime condition doesn’t take much skill or effort, but it requires consistency and good care on a daily basis. The rooms which bear heavy traffic or those often frequented by children and pets need extra care as these are prone to getting stained more often.
Floors can be categorized in two: wax finished and surface finished and each needs to be treated in a different manner. Apart from the regular cleaning that involves dust-mopping, sweeping and proper vacuuming, you should be aware of how to take care on their getting damaged accidently which can’t be avoided for ever. So you have to take wooden floor cleaning seriously.
Starting with the regular cleaning routine itself, never use water to clean the surface. Unless the floor manufacturer (if you have a prefinished floor) or the floor finish manufacturer (for floors finished on site) allows the use of damp mops, you’re only going to cause a lot of grief to the protective coating and in no time, to the wood underneath it. Water will certainly cause a treated floor to lose its color and shine and may cause its buckling or crowning. On a side note, don’t use domestic dust and surface cleaners, but rather what is recommended by the manufacturer of your floor. If the latter is unknown, use a generic hardwood floor cleaner that’s designed for the type of floor finish you have.
In case of any stains caused by ink, you should take immediate action to deal with them. You would almost always have to use a very fine or fine steel wool to take off the finish away (wax or polyurethane) before you can reach the contamination.
It’s good idea to use Oreck vacuum cleaner besides regular equipment. Take care to apply only the specified wood floor cleaner with a little of mineral spirits for removing the stain and allow the affected area to become dry, then apply wax and buff it off finally.