Advice on refinishing the wood floor surfaces to a natural finish
Our main goal is to change the current floor in our new house from a dark low shine finish to a non-shine natural wood finish. Here are our main questions:
1) How long should the job take? The house is 2 floors, about 1,500 sq.ft, roughly 8 rooms. 10-12 steps of stairs. I got quoted 1 day, and 3-4 days minimum, which is right? Does it mean 3-4 day people would do a "better" job than the 1-day job?
2) Should we choose water-based polyurethane or oil-based?
3) For the natural wood look, is there no need to stain the floor, would this result in lower cost?
4) Some providers suggested Bona while others said they use Duraseal. I would think the skills of the provider matters most and how many coats, but are there meaningful pros and cons to each brand or is this like asking if orange or apple is a better fruit? :)
5) For the look we are going for, is it better to opt for a satin finish or a matte finish on the coats?
Thanks!
We are in the process of closing on a house with dark stained wood floor with a low gloss. We would like to get the similar non-shiny finish of the floor we currently have in our apartment. I am wondering how long the job should take and what types of finishes should be used to get the results we want. Our current apartment floor is white oak engineered floor and it has a natural non-shiny finish which we really like as it doesn't show foot prints or water stains.
We are currently looking at various options, and some are suggesting water based polyurethane while others are suggesting oil based. We will be doing the refinishing before we move into the house so a couple of days to air out the smell probably isn't an issue. The primary concern is that we want the non-shiny look so that it's lower maintenance.
A couple of the providers we talked to said it would take 3-4 days for the job, while some of the providers say it would only take 1 day to do the full job as they will be using a water-based polyurethane that will dry in less than an hour and they will put 3-4 coats on it that same day. Would this results in a less desirable finish?
Also given that we want to have the natural wood look, is it safe to assume that after the floor is sanded, there is no need to stain the floor (I assume this gives it the coloring that one want if they want a darker or a particular coloring floor) and you can just coat it with sealer/polyurethane? Also is water or oil polyurethane better?
Our main concern is we do not want the wet or the shine look as we have a dog and find the shiny floor attracts footprints much easier (we are barefoot in the house, so sometimes when my wife puts lotions on the footprint was visible in our old floor which had a shine/polished finish.
Here are the picture of the floor that we would like to refinish (the kitchen and living room/dining room color are the same), and 2 pictures of the floor with the finish in our apartment that we want to match.
Comments (4)
SJ McCarthy
G & S Floor Service
Related Discussions
Office: how to finish it, refinish wood, etc.
Q
Wood Floor Refinish Problem
Q
red oak wood floor, stain or natural finish
Q
Refinishing 20 yr old maple floor with Bona Natural
Q
Angela Zuill
Albert TsengOriginal Author