Can somebody please direct me to somewhere where I can buy oil for wood floors? A shop or an agent company, perhaps. (Homepro and the likes does not have it. They have something called woodstain but it's not the same thing, I understand, and is not meant for floors either.)
It's OK if I have to go to Bangkok or somewhere. Now that I've spent a lot of money to buy old, huge floor planks from an old "Thai style" house, I've realised that I'd hate to "seal" the floor with polyurethane or lacquer. I know that oil is not the preferred treatment in Thai tradition, but I can't be the only one wanting it, so there should be somewhere to find it. I hope
Gutte, in our house in Issan we have teak floors upstairs and I used normal wax floor polish rubbed into the wood. You can buy five liter tins of this and it’s not expensive but it’s a time consuming business rubbing it in by hand. I really don’t know if this is an ideal solution but it was all I could find locally and it does look good when done.
Don't know where to get it in Thailand but if you do a search on Google for JUNCKERS RUSTIC OIL , you might find somewhere. This oil is superb and used throughout Europe by people in the Trade. Hope this helps.
I consider it confirmed that I will not be able to find what I look for here in Thailand. Timberex and Faxe are two other floor oil brands that I know of and the same goes for them - they have distributors in Japan but not here. Perhaps this is a potential business idea for someone who doesn't stay here permanently on a "retirement visa".
I will follow your advice Steve and go for waxed floors. The more I think about it the more sure do I feel that I don't want to cover my precious planks with plastic. The only one sorry I guess will be my not yet appointed maid. But I can probably afford to pay her a few months' extra salary for the tougher floor maintenance just from the money I'll save not buying polyurethane.
Gutte,
It might pay to look at some of the excellent "alternative" products that are around these days.
Common products like two pot epoxies can look pretty sweet but can really be a risk to your health during the application process especially in humid climates as they take ages and ages to cure off. Once cured they are not too bad but repairing any scratches usually means redoing the whole job again.
The plant based oils on my floors are based mainly on citrus oil, pure gum turpintine( not the mineral variety)and tung and eucalyptus oil.The application is delightful! The place smells like orange brandy for weeks after, and the vapours are very low in toxic terms.
The health aspects are not the only reason to use these products- you can chase this other info up yourself if you wish.
Repairing a scratch means a minute or two with a dab of oil and a cloth.
Livos from Germany and Organoil from Australia are two good brands that I've used but there are now many others around .( pm me if you need contacts for Thailand)
deepee
Just a thought, you seem to be going a long way to get the look you want (which I admire!). What about checking with one of the older, display house/museum in Bangkok to see what they may use?
Maybe it's apples and oranges, but thought I'd toss my 2 baht in.
Gutte, after reading Deepee’s description of his plant based oils; it occurs to me that if you couldn’t find anything else you could perhaps make your own. I’m sure you could buy linseed oil in a local hardware shop and obviously turpentine so perhaps with a bit of research you could work out a recipe. If I have the time, I’ll have a look around on the web later.
yeah,
Have ago at making your own if you can get all the gear together locally.Pure gum turps is preferred by oil paint artists to mineral turps so that may be clue to sourcing this item in Thailand.
We made up our own wall paints- used mainly with chalk , vegetable glue and lime. cost a fraction of the price of the off the shelf stuff and it's nice to not have to breathe all those vapours as that stuff gases off for the next few weeks.
Livos have a local rep in Bkk . See their site - com.livos.de
deepee
"Die Domain "www.com.livos.de" ist nicht verfügbar", unfortunately.
Thanks to everybody for interesting advice. I have tried to look into what they have traditionally used in Thailand. It seems like it comes down to some kind of wax. I have heard about a method used in schools, and probably in homes as well, where you heat candle stumps and mix it with coconut fat and rub it into the wood. I believe it helps to have 30 odd kids per room to help out. I also believe this method has more to do with cost efficiency than ultimate results.
I will come back to this thread and tell what decisions I finally make and how it turns out, in case anybody is interested.
