Your idea of putting down the plastic floor mat is a good one. Also, there are two different types of casters -- the most common casters on office chairs have hard nylon plastic rollers (designed to roll on carpets) which will leave marks, but there are also soft rubber rollers for hardwood floors. Check the link below. Here is a link that might be useful: Casters for Wood Floors

Agree. Get a clear smooth one and NOT one with those dimples for grabbing carpet underneath or it will look like someone went running in golf shoes under your desk. Put your nice area rug UNDER the pad.

Felt cushions on the feet help most. The plastic ones glide well, but they also pick up grit which scratches, and if they break a little the nail which holds them onto the chair pokes out and gouges. I've had the best luck with plastic castors. I think the grit only scratched the finish rather than the wood. But I didn't like that either since the rest of the floor doesn't get that much wear, so put a bamboo mat under the chair to protect the floor. This is in a desk area, so it doesn't look bad. It might make for a tripping hazzard at an island, however.

Yeah one finished room. (Of course still full of dust) They finished our bedroom yesterday. Still have to enventually come back and do the closet, but for now have moved on to the great room. camlan..Their doing the same thing here. Running the wood with no seams from room to room. I hope ours eventually "glow" right now they just glow of dust, but it still is looking nice. judydel. I like to buy rugs at TJ Max HomeGoods. Patty Cakes.. Oh no. The stairs is what inspired us to do this hardwood job. We just finished painting the stairs yesterday. The carpet that was on the stairs was old, dirty and ugly. It had to come up. My kids are teenagers, so hopefully safety wont be an issue. We'll see if they become too loud, etc., we can always eventually add a runner to them. beth..Your floors, rugs and house are beautiful. Thanks for sharing the photos and experience. work.. Thanks for the advice. I'll remember this for the near future. Id love a sweeper I could run on the floor and not have to worry about damage.