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Flooring Design Dilemma

Getting rid of the orangish/yellowish look on red oak hardwoods

2 months ago

last modified: 2 months ago

We need advice - our current red oak hardwoods have an orange/yellow look. We are having them redone due to water damage. They will be refinished soon and the company who is doing the work will be using Bona (water based) products. I'd like some advice on which Bona product to use - should we put Bona Red Out on the floors first? Then use the Bona NaturalSeal? Or, stay away from the Bona Red Out and just use the Bona NaturalSeal? We're trying to get rid of the orange/yellowish look. Thank you for your advice!

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Comments (5)

PRO
Patricia Colwell Consulting
2 months ago
I think you need to ask the floor refinisher to show you samples of the different choices. IMO the easiest way to get rid of th redor yellow is to stain dark. I do not find your floors very yellow.
PRO
Diana Bier Interiors, LLC
2 months ago
I agree with Patricia--the floors look like natural wood with no stain. Staining them darker will make them browner, and richer looking. I like Special Walnut for oak floors.
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My husband and I have been living your problem for the last couple weeks. We did a kitchen reno and had to replace a fairly large section of flooring in the area between the kitchen and living room. Our entire place is hardwood (probably original to the house- 1925) so we didn't want to refinish the whole floor. First attempt- applied only a few coats of oil based poly to bare, sanded wood. Floors appeared way too pink/rosy and light, not dark enough and didn't have the yellowish tint that the existing floors had. Next we resanded and experimented with a bunch of different colors of stain. We ended up using a couple different colors- one darker and one lighter. We left one of the coats on for way too long and it took forever to dry. Still wasn't the right color so we were concerned, but once it dried (several days later), we were able to apply more stain to segments of the floor that were still too pink or where we needed variation in color to match the existing floor. The color is looking pretty good- it's not perfect but is not too noticable. After the stain dries, we'll add some coats of oil based poly, which will hopefully darken it a little more and eventually give it that yellowish tint that comes with age. If your floors aren't fixed yet, I can give you the name of the stain colors we used- we tried so many I can't remember which ones we ended up using right now!
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I just wanted to update everyone with our decision. We were being quoted anywhere from $12k-$16k to lay and feather in about 600 sq ft of 3 1/4 " red oak down and to refinish everything so it matched. We decided to rip it all out because it was never going to give us the look that we wanted. And to get a flooring look we love, including the extra demo, it's going to cost us just under $13k for 1530 sq ft. of engineered wood floors. I've attached a photo of a sample of our lower and pantry cabinet with the sample of our flooring choice. Our uppers and island will be white cabinets.
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Lyn Nielson
2 months ago
with time, the natural sunlight turns the wood golden, when they already have a oil base finish.

The waterbase finish will help, follow the manufacturers instructions, and your professional, this isn't the project to DIY.
Lori Godfrey
2 months ago
last modified: 2 months ago
Red out works similar to how wood bleach works to remove the pink undertones in the red oak. If you are trying to make your red oak floor look like white oak, this product will help you achieve that.

If you like how your floors look when they are sanded down to barewood and don't mind the slight pinkish undertones that red oak tends to have, I would use the naturalseal. This product has a bit of white in it so it will also help keep a lighter natural red oak wood look without it looking bleached out.

Using water-based finish is also ideal if you don't like the orangey red tones so your floor guy is on the right path there. Oil based poly will amber over time and eventually you'll end up with exactly you are trying to get rid of.

Not an expert... just sharing the feedback I received elsewhere on the same topic as I am having my orange red oak floors refinished as well.
PRO
Diana Bier Interiors, LLC
2 months ago
Here's special walnut on old oak (not sure if it's red or white, but it's very old):
IMG_1026.MOV · More Info

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