Hi! I just wanted to let everyone know how our floors turned out . . . The owner of the flooring company finally came out to look at the floors and pronounced them unacceptable. He proposed sanding back down to the bare wood and starting over - which is what we'd hoped he would suggest. The plan was to sand the floors at an angle and then follow with a multi-head machine in order to remove the chatter marks. They also wanted to water-pop the floors prior to staining in order to achieve a richer, deeper color and then re-apply 3 coats of satin Bona Woodline poly. And the results were . . . GREAT! The chatter marks are still slightly noticeable (at least to us) but are not objectionable. The stain color is beautiful - we used 2 parts Dark Walnut to 1 part Red Oak - since the previous mix of 50-50 Provincial/Dark Walnut had produced a pale, cool color on our white oak. It's a much warmer, richer color now and we love it! For the poly application, we used our programmable thermostat to do the following: Warm the house to 74 degrees 1 hour prior to application Turn the air OFF as application began Turn the air back on at 68 degrees 4 hours after application They also took the poly home with them at night and took it inside to keep it warm. I have no idea which, if any, of these modifications worked to resolve the problem but we ended up with a streak-free floor and we're happy! We did have one problem though, that I want to mention as a warning . . . Around 1:30am after the 1st day of sanding, we received a call from our next door neighbor saying that a large black bag in front of our house was on fire. The bag (containing sawdust) was sitting at the base of our front steps (and in front of her car) and apparently had started to burn spontaneously. She was about to call 911 because her house was full of smoke but her son (whom she'd also called) arrived just in time to keep her from doing so. It took us about an hour outside in freezing temperatures and snow to get a hose hooked up, break open the bag, spread out the sawdust and wet it down until it stopped burning/smoking. Both homes and everyone's clothes smelled strongly of smoke and everyone had to shower before going back to bed. The next day (also in the snow), it took another hour or so to shovel up all the debris from the night before and bag it up so it could be thrown away. Not fun! Apparently, because the poly on the floors had been recently applied, it reacted with the sawdust and spontaneously combusted. We'd heard of this happening with stain-soaked rags but were unaware that it could happen in this manner. Very thankful the bag wasn't left in our house or garage! Anyway, there's a happy ending to our story and we're so very glad we decided to allow them the extra time to make the floors right!

You can order HD-80 Wood Stripper from www.woodrichbrand.com it will take off Cabot's stain. It is designed for contractors so you have to be careful with it and wear your protective gear. Here is a link that might be useful: Woodrich Brand

To add to G & S's comment above: Windex Original = 5% ammonia. The Bona Mega is NOT the top of the line Bona. It is the entry level. The scratches are hard evidence to prove this. And I do NOT like how white/deep those scratches are. That's not a great thing to see on a fresh finish. If MINWAX was used, the dry-time between stain and seal/finish can be 72 hours (that's 3 days....hmmm). Bona can work nicely with Minwax or it can have issues. Bona does not allow (officially) another stain brand to be used with their finishes. Bona Mega has a slightly longer dry time than Bona HD. The Mega can require 7-10 days to cure. That means the time that you can COVER IT is 7-10 days. So if we do the math, you need 3 days for the Minwax stain to dry before the coating systems is used. You need 2 days for 3 coats to be applied = 5 days into the process. Then we need another 7-10 days BEFORE we can COVER the floors with Ram Board. Now we are at 15 days. I think this job has been rushed. I do NOT like fresh floors covered up on day 4. Even Bona HD requires a full 5-7 days before they should be covered. Now for the stains. These are DEFINITELY man made (or should we say maid-made). I agree there is a sponge mark on the floor. That's the sold black mark. The 'bottle' outline, you will find, is an IDENTICAL shape to a Windex spray bottle. And the wrinkly brown stains are rag marks. If this floor was FULLY cured BEFORE the cleaning occurred, then it had a better chance of surviving these events. To be clear, a DAMP CLEANING on a wood floor is allowed after 2 weeks of FULL CURE. Your floors were NOT fully cured before the Ram Board was put down. You have ACTIVE chemicals that are curing on that floor. The maids should not have had anything 'wet' on that floor for another 15 days (you have to add another 10 days because the floors were covered up and therefore had not cured). There are three issues here: 1. Refinishers mixed their chemicals and used low-end Bona (HD is more expensive and offers MUCH BETTER protection). 2. Cure times were NOT respected and floors were covered too soon 3. Maids were allowed in (without specific instructions) and allowed to wet clean these floors before the floors were ready for it. That's a WHOLE LOT'A finger pointing going on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azjMjPN8HPY&t=426s So I have been researching for months to find a way to get all the stain off my deck. Floor sanders are not the way to go for decks. Last year it was peeling and I covered it with carpet. Again covered it with carpet this year. I was waiting for mother nature to remove it for me, before I do anything else. It's almost all off and I plan on using the the diamondbrush to remove what is left then use Thompson's Water seal to seal it, and again every couple of years. I will not stain it again. Does not last on boards that are flat on top of deck. The boards that are vertical have held up very well, but where sun and snow sits - not so good. To answer your question, you may have to wait til it dries before doing any thing, being sticky/gummy mayl clog up any kind of equipment. I used BM stain which I though would be the best.