Quality Control Assurance

Home

First off, we would like to point out that widespread use of advertising slogans about “Superior Product Quality” and the use of 25-50 year warranties are used by many companies that don’t have the quality control procedures, quality standards, or any quality improvement methods to back up their claims.  Chelsea Plank Flooring®, and Restoration Series Plank™ product lines are both manufactured by Frame Hardwoods, Inc., a well managed, family-owned American company that is leading the industry in quality advancement and new product development.

At Frame Hardwoods, we take our own quality control very seriously.   We continuously monitor our product quality and compare continual testing data to our established quality standards.  In addition, we don’t just maintain quality at status quo, we strive to improve quality, efficiency of the process, and maintain consistency.   This attention to quality has earned us a reputation in the industry as a very high quality plank flooring manufacturer well known throughout North America.

The co-owner and founder of Frame Hardwoods inspects quality of the products being produced on a daily basis at several key points in the manufacturing process.   These key inspection points include inspecting the in-coming raw material, the process where raw lumber is ripped into desired fixed widths, to the milling process where flooring is machined with the tongue & groove, end-matched, inspected and sorted into specific products.   Beyond this is our own in-house UV finishing process, including product color matching and finish quality inspection and testing.  Even the accuracy of orders pulled is sysytematically checked for accuracy before orders are shipped.  Our finish line operations manager checks the quality of our UV finish multiple times thru the day and all test results are recorded.  The records are maintained and compared over a long-term period. Test samples of the actual finished product are also tested at Chemcraft International for all important design characteristics such as:

  1. Adhesion - how well the finish is bonded to the wood
  2. Abrasion resistance - how well the finish resists being worn off
  3. Scratch resistance- how well the finish resists penetration
  4. Gloss level - consistent gloss levels keep the floor looking even and smooth
  5. Water resistance- dampness can result in the finish peeling away from the wood
  6. Impact resistance - test how well the finish will stay bonded to the wood when impacted be a hard object. 

 The test results on our finish are truly outstanding and they are very consistent from one day to the next.

In addition to top management overseeing and providing guidance in quality control procedures and quality improvement methods, all group leaders in the production facility are well trained and experienced in quality control testing, and quality standards for the process they are responsible for.   In turn, all production employees are responsible for producing a quality product.   Our people really care about producing a quality product.  They are constantly looking for better ways to do things, more efficient methods and  better ways of eliminating defects.   This team effort is what makes continuous quality improvement  and consistency possible.   Group leaders from production areas report on a daily basis to the owner with quality control measurement reports showing that all the critical quality measurements have been taken throughout the day to assure that the quality standards are being maintained.


Computer and Laser Guided Saw


Boards ready to be cut


Board Finish Analysis


Climate Controlled Storage


Climate Controlled Storage