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Flooring Design Dilemma

Too much color variegation in hardwood floor - can refinishing fix it?

2 years ago

My friend is looking at buying a house with brand new hardwood floors that she hates. She wants a uniform neutral color - preferably a lighter color. Is it possible to even out the color without going way dark? Bleaching? She would prefer not to rip out this brand new floor and take it to the dump.

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HU-161159613

2 years ago

I think it's hickory and it's gorgeous! Maybe with rugs and furniture it will look great!

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Comments (10)

raee_gw zone 5b-6a Ohio
2 years ago
Can she find out more about the floor? It almost looks like a mix of woods! Or maybe a mix of prefinished stains. If this is all one variety, stain, and grade, then you are seeing how each plank naturally takes up stain and I don't think that sanding and restaining to a darker color will wipe out all the variation - might make it a little less obvious (but have her send a photo to a refinisher and ask his opinion)
PRO
G & S Floor Service
2 years ago
Looks like hickory, will be tricky. Two part bleach might even it out.
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OK I explain. It is a floating floor what we call in the UK engineered floor, so it is not solid throughout but a thickness of the wood mounted on a plywood base. It is a Malaysian wood, not so hard, so I suppose high heels could dent it perhaps, it is not the hardest. It is a click system not requiring glue, interesting. Now from Malaysia it says it has five factory coatings of which some contain aluminium oxide. It got worn out over the years. So a year ago I sanded the wood with the machines with the correct paper and vacuumed well. Then I applied one coat of Bona Traffic silk, you know the glossy one. I then noticed a number of parts were very coarse to the touch. So after some hours I sanded again with slightly finer paper but still coarse. Now I applied again Bona. Once again certain areas were coarse to the touch and you could see stains. So now I did a final very fine sanding but this was by hand with very fine paper particularly in the areas affected. It took me hours. Then I applied the third coat. I called the Bona representative who was at a loss!!! He gave me a bottle of Bona "refresh" it is a type of product to do another pass over. I applied it to the worse parts of the floor. Although one could see areas which were coarse to the touch and which did not look quite right the shine was sufficient to fool guests for Christmas. Now I am exactly one year on. In those area I mentioned there are now black marks. I attach some photos of the present situation with example of the black marks. (sorry I do not know how to create a new thread). I want to sand it and apply Bona again before New Year when my mother is visiting, my wife will just about tolerate me sanding on the 27th Dec. I had the suspicion it was the Bona product maybe the bottle I bought was old or had been exposed to low temperatures where I bought it from but the Bona representative told me it was very unlikely to be the case.
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The 'bubbles' look to be debris that has been trapped underneath (a few layers of) the finish. I could be wrong but from the photos it looks more like debris then finish failure. As to removing the 'sealant' (which we call the finish = polyurethane) there is no way to remove just the finish without going past the staining. The work to do this should be pretty easy because most of the work has already been done. If you have debris trapped underneath the finish (again this is just my assumption based on two photos) you can negotiate the price of the redo. If this is adhesion failure (horror of horrors) it will cost you NOTHING. Adhesion failure is 'paid for' by the refinisher. Right now, we know nothing for sure. If you want to change the colour, you will need to negotiate the price. And you will have to FIND OUT what the finish was (Bona is a brand...it isn't the name of the line...we need the name of the LINE of finish) and make sure it is NOT used again. I have a sneaking suspicion the finish is the Bona Mega which is helping turn your floor orange. You will have to confirm this when you speak with the refinisher about the lumps and bumps in the finish. The refinisher is responsible for 'knocking these down'.
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Thank you for sharing these thoughts. Just to clarify, all the issues we saw were noticeable at the arms length, and judging by the last picture the contractor had to scape so deep into the finishing to remove some of these, which I'm guessing means that some were not in the top coat. The company said that they have someone else to spot fix. I'd love to know if the spot fixing is really possible. What potential issues you see with spot fixing? Is re-coating better? What the risks of re-coating are? What do you see as a potential realistic solution bfor us, especially given the cost of the project?
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okaycoral
Original Author
2 years ago
Nope so busy it makes her dizzy and I agree. Not her style. I would not have it in my house either. Maybe she can have it sanded and painted.
starnold
2 years ago
Why live with something you hate? Offer it on Craigslist and see if someone will buy and take out- then get what whatever she wants.
SJ McCarthy
2 years ago
Welcome to the world of wide plank hickory! Super tough wood. Very busy. Enigmatic floor with HORDES of personality. Sadly the one your friend has just purchased is *probably a lower quality one. There are DOZENS of short boards in the pics. They look to be factory finished which means it can be a total B!tch to refinish. And the planks aren't very thick. It is entirely possible this floor *might not handle a refinish.

Rip it out or cover it up. Wall to wall carpets will work very well for a few years. Then she can save up enough money to remove ($2/sf) and purchase ($9/sf) and replace ($3/sf for install) the entire floor.
Timothy Winzell
2 years ago
The only hope would be to sand, water pop, apply a light stain and coats of finish. For a stain I'd recommend a mix of white pickling stain and a medium brown like Chestnut, probably in the range of 10:1 or 20: 1 to start.
Jennifer
2 years ago
Hickory usually has lots of color variation especially if light colored. It is much harder than other woods so will be a great floor. However, if she hates it, change it. Sanding and refinishing is not inexpensive and will not solve the variation issue. I have very dark engineered hickory and love it.
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G & S Floor Service
2 years ago
You can always dye the floor a light brown. For a less potent color, add a reducer to the dye. A chemical stain will work on it , also.
PRO
Patricia Colwell Consulting
2 years ago
NO PAINTING for crying out loud. Get a floor refinisher and see what is possible IMO the choice is to go darker to even out the color . I really dislike hickory for exactly this reason so I agree if she really hates it remove it sell it and get what she loves.

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