Why do i need profiles & accessories?

Because they enhance the whole look and feel of your floor! Profiles are often the last thought on the mind buying the floor but without due care and consideration for what is needed, the floor can look poorly finished. Even without the importance of the aesthetic aspect, profiles play an important roll in the fitting and longevity of the floor, in-particular, wood floors. Profiles provide cover for necessary expansion gaps both around the perimeter of rooms and across door thresholds. Without the necessary expansion, hardwood flooring can bow, dish or push bricks out of walls.

With the correctly specified profiles, perimeter expansion and door threshold covers vanish to become part of the floor.

What might I need?

Working out what accessories you’ll need to complete your flooring can be a slightly daunting task. However, there are a few tips and tricks to making the process much smoother:

Because engineered wood flooring requires an expansion gap around the perimeter of the room, you will need a profile to cover it. If you are not removing existing skirting boards, the quickest and easiest way to cover expansion gaps is to use a scotia moulding. If you plan to remove the existing skirting we can offer a hardwood replacement to match your floor.

Any door way into/out of the room where the flooring is being laid will require a profile to join the wood to any other floorcovering on the other side. These profiles can take a few different forms, depending upon the relative flooring heights but are often twin or ramp sections.

Another consideration is edging mat wells or fire place hearths. As expansion is required around these solid obstacles, thought needs to be applied to how the edges of the flooring will be covered along the edges. Generally flat cover plate sections or scotia is the preferred method.

colour matched accessories

The beauty of buying a floor through Rafe Olsen is that we can also supply you with coloured matched accessories to accompany your bespoke flooring. We take unfinished solid Oak flooring profiles and apply the same processes to them as we do your floor. Obviously there is always a degree of natural colour variation but we can minimise this by producing the accessories at the same time as the floor.

Rafe Olsen are able to produce bespoke colour matched profiles in a variety of shapes and sizes dependant upon your specific needs. These include but aren’t limited to: door bars (end, twin and ramp profiles), stairnosing, pipe covers and skirting, scotia and other edging sections. Please give us a call to discuss your specific requirements.

Oils & Cleaners

The experience of producing finishing your own floor with your bare hands is an incredibly fulfilling one. As such we are able to offer some of the colours and stains we use in house for you to use at home. Additionally, you can buy our engineered hardwood flooring unfinished if you are short of time or looking for something that can be given a top coat after it has been laid.

It is vitality important that your floor is properly looked after and cared for. To that ends, Rafe Olsen offers a range of cleaning products to keep your floor looking it’s best whilst also being gentle on the top surface.

adhesives

Our personal feeling is Rafe Olsen engineered hardwood flooring feel best under foot when stuck down to the substrate floor with adhesive. Whilst we understand this is not always viable, where possible it should be prioritised. The recommendation we use is for a Sika product. This is available in two variations; one for normal substrate flooring and one where underfloor heating is being used. It is important to ensure the correct adhesive is used otherwise it may fail to adhere properly.