They sanded and did semi. We are OK with the color, and the finish looks much better. Not too shiny, almost no brush marks/swirls, but still a few minor bumps that we're going to deal with. I think we'll never notice them, and they'll either wear down or get overshadowed by our own marks, as Floortech said. So everything is great ... except that the literally missed a spot. They skipped the toe-kick area under one short cabinet run. Hopefully, this is a simple touch-up and can be feathered in. As for the bumps, etc, we think there were two problems. One is probably the bad cleanup between coats as brandygirl suggested. The other problem probably should have been more obvious to everyone, but the GC is the one who figured it out. He hung up plastic to protect the cabinets and the rest of the house from the sanding before they started. When they sanded, lots of dust clinged to the plastic. Then they started to put down the poly. We think that general air motion through the house -- from the AC, from closing or opening doors, etc -- send enough turbulence to shake dust off of the plastic. It then landed on the floor. Re: next time -- I'm not planning on having a next time!! Thanks for the help.

Yes, it's an 18" applicator that looks like a paint roller, but the thing doesn't roll. Some of us roll our finish onto the floor with a paint roller and one manufacturer specifies a particular finish be applied only with a roller. In waterborne finishes look for those by BonaKemi, Basic Coatings, Vermeister, Duraseal, Poloplaz...and many others. They are available through flooring supply dealers. The two-part products are usually the best (most durable), although I have used one-part waterborne and got great results which my customers are still satisfied with many years later. Read the MSDS sheets for the products and follow instructions and cautions...these are named professional use products for good reason. A good floor finisher will vacuum a floor AND the perimeter several times to remove any debris that might wind up in the finish. A crevice tool is used to get into those spaces between baseboard and floor and other nooks and crannies to suck out any debris that one good puff of wind could blow out and onto the floor.

I just wanted to chime in to 2nd what pharaoh said. The guy who did my floors told me the same thing about all coats being gloss and only the final coat is the desired finish. My finish came out perfect. I think everyone overreacted after the first coat. Which probably says your floor contractor isn't very experienced. That first coat will always be flawed because it can't possibly provide complete coverage. That's because your floor is not perfectly flat. With each coat, the layers build and everything starts to even out. To really see the final finish they should have did the whole process on a board. That's what my guy did. He took a board and applied the three coats, including the sanding between coats. That's the only way to get a feel for what the end result would be like. For you, it's not too late. Take a step back and experiment with several scraps starting with two coats of gloss on each. Then apply the various mixes for the final finish to determine your desired mix. Then just sand the floor (no need to strip it), apply the gloss to repair the base layer and finish with the top. You'll basically end up with four coats but it'll be fine. I had my upstairs done by a different guy (because he was cheaper and as a favor to my MIL because he was a "friend") and he screwed up the finish. I ended up hiring the first guy to fix it which is how I know what I said above. In the end, it ended up costing me the same as if I had hired the first guy to do the job. Lesson learned.

I just went through the same thing. But then I'm a rehabber and get my fixer uppers at foreclosure sales at half their final market value. Hand the contractor a copy of your photos, and then simply lock the contractor out of the house. Ignore any payment the contractor thinks they have coming. And start over. Document what's there. but it looks like you have plenty of pictures in hand in case the contractor has the gall to complain later formally or try to take credit for someone else's work. Moving on, the first thing you'll want to do is change your mindset to only contracting out a room or two at a time. If the contractor doesn't work out, there is less money involved. I've never seen a floor contractor who would or could show the work of his last job, especially with old rehab floor boards. I'm sure it is difficult since they often times got fired from their last job. It is true that a good contractor can take one look at your floor and assess it on sight. The problem is that you can't, and you can't tell a real contractor from a poser, and you can't believe anything that you are told by a poser. Next you'll need to assess a room of interest. You'll need to drum sand at 36 or 40 grit. A Home Depot $75/day drum sander will work fine. Always spread lowering the drum control over a 12" long rolling movement to prevent burning the floor, which is the term for a hard drum drop. An untrained millenial with that instruction could do it if you take away his cell phone for the day. You'll need the millenial for the day anyway to lift the sander. Subsequent sandings at higher grit numbers will follow. End with an orbital 12x18" sander finish buff at 100 grit starting with pencil marks on 5 separate occasions then twice with the 12x18" screen buff with use of a $1 carpenters pencil to scribble on every sq ft of sanded oak between every grit number. Any floor contractor could do it, but few will do it piecemeal. A 6" 60 grit disc on a Harbor Freight $130 Hercules Sander is used for edge sanding and to feather out any accidental drum drops which are simple to find after the first coat of stain is applied. Stay clear of professional edge sanders, which homeowners often times call the Tasmanian Devil. Stain and finish are applied wearing an FDA Approved air pressure mask fed by an air hose from a $500 HobbyAir machine plugged in outdoors. The proactive approach is more like feeling out the unstained floor with finger tips like Helen Keller or shining daylight or hallogen light on the bare sanded oak before staining to find any dips caused by hard drum drops. Using a flooring contractor, probably the best you could do would be an option to quit at $1 a sq/ft or two if the drum sanding doesn't yield accceptable results. If the floor gets too thin or the marks you wish to lose are too deep to sand out before making the floor too thin, then you have your answer, and you are ready for new wood. New wood doesn't cost much. I paid $3.20 sq/ft for the wood material plus self installation. Always pay more for longer boards in the mix. And your floor looks beat and pet or plant water stained half to death anyways. New red oak of dubious quality is widely available on Facebook for $1/sq ft in any sized quanity. You'd think you died and went to heaven if $1/sq ft new oak flooring in 2.5" width was installed in lieu of your existing flooring, moisture content, acclaimation time, and warpage aside...start really small. Dark stain like Minwax Jacobean, two or three coats, and a 15 minute wait time will cover almost anything in minimally acceptable fashion on really beat floors. Once you pull that thread in the sweater of rehab, the whole sweater often times unravels. Replacing wood flooring is not an all or nothing proposition. In one house with 1700 sq ft, I had 2 sq ft replaced in 4 different rooms, before final drum sanding. They can reweave in a repair for about $300 a spot and if the carpenter is good, you can't even tell. It is a refinish contractor who knows the good temp floor carpenters that do good spot repairs. In another house, I paid a demo contractor to remove all the existing boards and then nailed in 3286 sq ft of new red oak using a $160 floor cleat nailer from Harbor Freight, a $50 jig saw, and a $90 Porter Finish nailer from Harbor Freight, and a $160 air compressor from Harbor Freight, and a $110 10" framing saw from Home Depot. It took weekends for a couple of months. Cleats are about $10 a box at Harbor Freight. Any handyman with access to youtube videos can do the installation. The trick is hidden female-female join strips available over the counter from Lumber Liquidators for 50 cents /ft and special order nose pieces for $4/ft that have the 1/4 female grove for level drops like stairs. Works just like lego. Cleats only go in the male connection or tongue side. I hired an unsuspecting millenial handyman through Angi's List by asking for floor leveling and trained him using youtube videos to do the leveling, sanding, staining, and polyurethane paid one day at a time. Even that has to be limited to a room or two a day. Cost was less than half professional estimates and few flooring contractors will do anything without a contract for everything, and you never know which steps he can do well, and which he will fail at. In Chicago, a good flooring contractor has a cost of $1.5 sq ft., but they only like to work in the city limits. In Ohio, it's more like $10/sq ft for just the finish contractor even on simple unfinished new wood installation, which is what they all figure they are worth. You'd have to do a room complete yourself to qualify for project managing others, but then you'd be very capable for knowing when to fire someone. 90% of professional flooring installers fail at floor leveling or rather floor smoothing in older houses. After talking with the president of the NHWA, and the all of the most expensive flooring contractors in my area, it is obvious that I'm the most knowledgeable in leveling or smoothing out 20 year old big box Homes believed to have been built by the cheapest contractors in all the land. Don't allow removal of any wood strips or other underlayment pieces especially those glued or stapled in place under the existing flooring or you risk entering into the wonderland of the next level of skilled craftsman, the floor leveler who will offer to remove your floor boards to the rafters and install new underlayment plywood in lieu of leveling on top of your existing floor underlayment.