Ciranova ? Pink Blocker can be used with any competitors brand stain. I have not experienced any issue. You do need to buff with a maroon pad prior to applying a stain with other manufacturer's WB PU. I have not applied any other WB except for Ciranova's own WB PU over Pink blocker. No time for experimenting. Pink Blocker is a reactive stain. It is water soluble. Ciranova has a binder in their invisible line finishes : Ecofix plus, Woodlook Plus and Oculto. It helps prevent reactivating the stain and moving the color around. Reactive stain can be applied after pink blocker. Still needs buffing with maroon pad. You can use the regular reactive stain on red oak. It will not be as intense as if, it was applied onto white oak. Aquavintage is a two part reactive stain. hardwax oil , oil poly or wb poly can be applied. If, using WB poly, use one of Ciranova's invisible poly. Ecofix for light natural colors. Woodlook for whites and grays and Oculto for dark tone reactive stains. It is water soluble, competitors WB PU will move finish around. If, you want a WB system that looks like a oil finish. Ciranova's invisible line is what you want. It will look as natural or raw as can be with the protection of a WB system. For added protection, you can do two coats of their invisible finish and two coats of Fortico. Fortico is comparable to Bona Traffic HD and Loba's Supra AT. You can top coat Ciranova's invisible finishes with competitors WB finishes. That will help keep cost down. Only downside, if, you run into issues. The tech support will not help you. Use your own discretion. Unico is the same as RMC. It's a single coat oil system with the added benefits of being able to apply a WB PU over it. It's soft, top coat with one coat of Titan or two coats of Fortico for the added protection. Titan is better than RMC. Note: every manufacturer alters their binders slightly in their finishes to make it unique. It creates issues with other manufacturers products. You would need to test samples to make sure there are no finishing issues. I have used Ciranova's reactive stain with RMC and Pallmann's oil with no issues. I have tried applying a competitors WB PU over Ciranova's reactive stain with no success. It moves the color around. But when used with Ciranova's invisible PU, no issues. You can apply dewaxed shellac over the reactive stain and apply a competitor's WB PU or just apply oil base poly. Keep in mind oil base poly will turn yellow. For aged look, it does not look good. If, you want the aged look use Ciranova. you won't be disappointed, unless your guy does not know how to use it. For a stained look, you can use any other brand. The colors are all the same, besides Duraseal, which has more colors available than anyone.

Both Loba and Rubio are "special" finishes. Special in that not everyone is A. aware of them or B. trained on them. Loba Invisible is a water based finish with a low-gloss finish (it is their "matte" finish in the AT line). It is for those people who want the LOOK of oil finished without the MAINTENANCE of oil finished. The cost of Loba (any of their options) will be the up-front material costs. They are expensive but thankfully you get MORE than you pay for. More benefits. More scratch resistance. Excellent longevity. As a water based finish, it has different working times (wet edges are very different time frame than oil based finishes). And the mixing can be confusing for a refinisher "trying it out" for the first time. Other than the learning curve and the costs, it is relatively easy to use...ONCE the refinisher understands the process. In fact many people praise how easy it is...AFTER they get used to it! The Rubio is different. It is a relatively low-cost product to PURCHASE...but the costs come in the LABOUR. Rubio requires PERFECTION when it comes to sanding. It can take an extra 2-3 passes with the sander (and much higher grit levels) than a traditional/water based polyurethane. So...your refinisher absolutely MUST be trained on the sanding technique. If not, it will look ABYSMAL! And I mean crying and a sense of hopelessness - "How did this happen?" or "What do I do now?" are the questions often asked once a Rubio floor is mucked up. So Rubio has extra costs hidden in the LABOUR costs...but the material costs are quite low. And then there is the maintenance. Loba = none. Just basic wipe with damp cloths, sweep, refinish in 20 years. Rubio = much more. The homeowner will need to have ALL the cleaning and repair products ON HAND for the very first day of possession. The homeowner should pay the contractor to give a "maintenance" lesson before the hand over of the keys to the house. This should include scrubbing technique, cleaning techniques and then application techniques with both cleaning oils, maintenance oils AND the coloured oil (if you stain) should it be required to do a full patch at some time. The Hardwax oils are lovely. But they require certain maintenance. And in a lively household that can be spot cleaning and reapplying the finish if a stain appears. Water spots will need to be dealt with by a spot cleaning and reapplication of the colour/finish. Adding in the yearly "whole home" maintenance oiling" is another requirement. This can be done in high traffic areas every year...and then every 2-3 years you can move all the furniture out of the way and apply the maintenance oil over the entire space. You then leave for 6-8 hours and when you come back it should be ready for the furniture to be put back. Happily this can be done room by room as your home allows...which means it can take a week or more to do all the floors in all the rooms if you go one-by-one. You are welcome to hire these jobs out...but the beauty of the Rubio is it is supposed to be easy enough for the homeowner to maintain. But that means the homeowner has to take the time and the effort (out of his/her busy schedule) to do all the maintenance. Loba...simply love it and leave it. I'm far too lazy to deal with hardwax oils. Regardless of how I feel about the LOOK of them, I know darned well that I'm too lazy to take on 20+ years of homeowner maintenance. Homeowner, Know Thyself.

Wow! Ok...the good news is you are getting the ENTIRE floor sanded (including the treads) and refinished. Excellent! That's what is needed at this point. Now for the treads...MOST stair treads are RED oak. That MIGHT BE why the treads take the stain a little differently than the WHITE OAK flooring (make sense now doesn't it?). The Loba HS 2K ImpactOil is comparable to Rubio = oiled finish. Here's the link to the GERMAN website (not the USA...the European website is MUCH better for product information). https://www.loba.de/us/products/natural-oils-and-waxes/natural-oils/product/hs-2k-impactoil-color/ The ImpactOil is NOT compatible with the surface finishes like Invisible AT. Do not mix the two. Now...onto the colours. Loba makes their own stains. The original floors had "white line" syndrome = the finished had BONDING FAILURE throughout the home. That was the original problem (regardless of the flooding). The stain was INCOMPATIBLE with the FINISH (whatever the finish was). This is the very reason why you should NEVER mix chemical families (Loba + Loba = success; DuraSeal + DuraSeal = success). The ImpactOil is new(er) the the N. American market. The VERY FIRST THING I would ask the refinishers is: Have you attended the Loba training classes? You are looking for a 'yes' when it comes to both the Invisible and the ImpactOil. If you need support, Loba is just a phone call away. They have their N. American headquarters in N.Carolina.

Actually, I think you might be fine to move forward with your final 2 coats of Loba 2K Supra AT (for 3 coats total). One of the exceptions to this is if you need something to prevent side bonding with your wood. Look up side bonding and then figure out if you think it is going to be a problem for you in your climate. That's the main thing that the WS EasyPrime prevents is side bonding; in addition, it brings out a rich wood color and helps the first coat of Supra AT to go on more evenly. If you like the color that you have now and side bonding is not a huge concern, then you would probably be better off to move forward rather than trying to sand that floor down again as that could create some brand new issues for you. It's probably not the end of the world that you skipped the hardener on the first coat. If anything, it might make the upper two layers a little more prone to impact, but this coating has a lot of flex built into it, and if you can live with the risk, it might be acceptable for your application. If this is an expensive home with a heavy grand piano or big dogs with claws, then reconsider leaving that first coat unhardened. Also, if this is an area where heavy appliances will be moved or set, I would also consider a re-do. Although I've worked a lot with WS EasyPrime and Loba 2K Supra AT, I'm not a professional, and Loba has an excellent customer service department, at least in the USA where I have utilized it, so if you are able to call and talk to a company representative, that would be the best option for professional advice on your situation. You may find it interesting to know that Loba makes a product called 2K InvisibleProtect AT which is designed to be used alone, without primer, in order to keep the wood as natural a color as possible. Some people have had issues trying to apply InvisibleProtect AT without a primer first, but it can be done. The 2K Supra AT is not usually used for this because it does impart more of a darkening effect than the InvisibleProtect AT--therefore primer doesn't take away from the final effect when Supra AT is used, and there are benefits to primer (side bonding prevention mainly), so it is standard procedure to use the WS EasyPrime under Supra AT. Note that Supra AT is overall more durable than InvisibleProtect AT, though both are outstanding finishes.