The finish most Gold Coast homes end up choosing. Two components mixed on site, almost no smell, and a clear coat that keeps your timber the colour it is instead of pushing it orange over the years.
A 2-pack water-based polyurethane arrives as two parts: the polyurethane itself and a hardener (an isocyanate cross-linker). They get mixed in the tin on your job and the clock starts, so the coating has to go down inside its pot life. That cross-linking is where the toughness comes from. A single-pack water-based coat dries; a 2-pack cures into a much harder film.
The water is only the carrier. It flashes off, and what is left behind on your boards is a clear resin film with no solvent left in it. That is why the smell is closer to wet paint than to the old solvent finishes people remember from the 1990s.
Three reasons come up on nearly every quote. It does not yellow, so a pale floor stays pale and a limewash stays cool instead of going amber. It is low odour, so families with kids, asthma or pets can stay in the house. And it dries fast enough that we can put three coats down in the time a solvent finish takes for two.
The practical upshot is that a standard three-bedroom floor is sanded, coated and walkable inside the same week rather than the same fortnight. Furniture back in a few days later, once the film has had time to harden off.
The floor is cut back through a grit sequence to bare timber, edges and corners done by hand, then vacuumed and tacked. A water-based sealer goes on first, which locks the timber down and stops side bonding between boards. It is denibbed with a fine screen once it is dry, because the first coat always lifts the grain slightly.
Then two topcoats of the 2-pack. On heavy traffic areas, hallways, kitchens, holiday rentals, we recommend a third. Each coat is rolled with the boards and cut in by hand at the skirtings, and we check the light across the floor between coats so nothing gets missed.
If you want the warm amber glow that a solvent-based polyurethane gives an older hardwood, a water-based coat will not fake it. It leaves the timber looking like the timber. Some people love that on spotted gum and blackbutt and miss the warmth on old brushbox.
It is also a poorer choice if the floor cannot be kept dry and dust-free for the curing window, or if there is an existing wax or oil in the boards that will not fully sand out. We check both before we quote.
A 2-pack water-based coating is. It is the single-pack water-based products that are softer. The cross-linker is what does it, which is why we only use 2-pack systems on floors that get real traffic.
Barely. It raises the grain a touch and slightly deepens the natural colour, but it does not add the amber cast a solvent finish does, and it does not keep yellowing with age.
Almost always. The odour is low and it clears fast. We work room by room where we can and set up dust extraction so the rest of the house stays usable.
That is what the free in-home estimate is for. We will look at your timber, show you samples on it, and tell you honestly what will work.
Tell us about your floor and we will get back to you fast, usually the same day, to book a free in-home look and an honest price.
Local timber floor sanding, polishing and restoration across 97 suburbs - from the Logan line and the hinterland to the NSW Northern Rivers. View all areas we service
Fine FinishedFloors
Floors worth showing off - cut back, stained and finished by Gold Coast specialists since 2010.
22 Springsure Drive,
Mudgeeraba QLD 4213
Monday to Saturday, 7am to 5pm
Servicing the Gold Coast, Logan fringe and Northern NSW to Ocean Shores. Free, no-obligation in-home estimates.