100-year old white oak flooring must almost certainly be quarter sawn and beautiful. Achieving an ebonized finish is straightforward if your use a water soluble or alcohol soluble die instead of stain. However, why would you want to hide that beautiful grain? People would kill to afford quarter sawn white oak today. Why not sand it and use a good medium oak like the flooring was probably finished in originally? Will

Since my husband and I recently went through this DIY, I can make a few suggestions, although we didn't refinish, we installed unfinished rustic inexpensive red oak floors ourselves and finished them. I don't know anything about removing a wax finish, maybe someone here can advise or you could try a different hardwood flooring forum. For the sander we rented a U-sand, which is a floor sanding machine that is supposedly made for the DIY'er. It worked great, got right up to the edges and was really easy to use. I don't know how well it would perform for refinishing, as that involves more sanding. For the stain and poly, we went with the professional grade stuff. It was so worth the extra money as the products were much more forgiving to work with, and I think will have better long term durability. We went with the Bona products which are designed for hardwood floors. We`used the Bona Drifast stain, which is an oil modified stain that dries quickly. The stain is very rich looking and was wonderful with any accidental overlap. We mixed a couple different colors for a custom stain color. We went with the new Bona waterbased Traffic HD in the extreme matte finish and I love it. I think the traffic HD has one of the highest durability commercial ratings. A matte finish will hide more imperfections and scratches than a shiny finish. Although it says extreme matte, the finish does have a slight shine with a very natural wood look, it looks great with our rustic grade floors. I've never seen a poly finish like it, it's so velvety smooth and natural looking. It's sheen is in between Bona Naturale and Bona Traffic Satin HD. The water based polys I believe are more durable than the oil base and this one is meant to go on top of Bona's oil base stain. The Bona waterbase poly also had very little fumes that disappeared with in a couple days. It has a separate catalyst (hardener) that has to be added and then you have 4 hours once you add the hardener in. We were concerned at first, but with the T-bar applicator, we were able to get one application done in about 45 min-1 hour (650 sqft+ stairs). We have two dogs who like to race around the house and hate to have their nails clipped, I have yet to see a scratch, this finish seems to be wearing like iron, I am so impressed. We applied the stain, waited 48 hours, then applied the first coat of poly, the next day we buffed it, wiped down with a damp cloth, let it dry and then applied the second coat and let it fully cure. We bought the T-bar poly applicator, which worked out well. We also bought the Bona Mixer bottle, so we could mix smaller batches when we needed to and didn't have to mix up a whole bottles worth. This was 7.00 well spent as we mixed up a gallon and a half for each application. For wood filler we tried Woodwise floor filler, and Timbermate, I thought the Timbermate performed a little better, but both products were much better than anything at Lowes, or Home Depot. The waterbased wood fillers are great because wiping off excess with a damp rag is fairly easy, even after it's dried. Plastic putty tools should be used with the waterbased fillers as some metal scrapers can discolor the filler. Since the Bona products are professional grade, we bought them through a company that sells to the general public and professionals. Their business is mostly an online store, but people can come in and buy products from them locally. Since they were local for us we got to talk to them in person. They were great, they took the time to answer all our questions each time I stopped in for products. I found them extremely knowledgeable and very caring, their how to videos on their website were also helpful. Floor Mechanics Online Store We spent about 1,750.00 total for 1,000 sqft of very rustic red oak flooring, Pneumatic floor nailer, moisture meter, sander/buffer rental, and finishing products. It was some work, but worth it for site finished, solid hardwood flooring. Good luck with your son's floors.

just re-read what i wrote, and i think it could come across as if OP was a customer of mine, not true. i had nothing to do with this one, id like to take credit :) but im just happy they are happy with their outcome.

You might want to read this valuable advice from SJ McCarthy written earlier today. https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5806177/difference-between-white-oak-and-red-oak-flooring SJ McCarthy The ORANGE you are seeing is the finish. The oil based polyurethanes are products that turn WHITE PAPER orange. It is called ambering. The red oak floors in the photo have been finished with an oil based finish. This is common practice but not currently attractive in today's 'white is best' flooring fashion. The issue I have with redoing the floors is this: The floors will loose 20 years of life if you sand/refinish them today. How do I know this? Because a site finished floor is supposed to offer 25 years of 'life'. A solid 3/4" hardwood (which I'm guessing this is) will offer 60 - 80 years of service (that's 3 sand/refinishes during it's lifetime). Each time you 'change' the colour (on a whim or due to current fashion) you cut down the life of your 'lifetime' floor. If you do this 3 times in 20 years (today, 10 years from now and then 20 years from now) you will have cut the life of your floor down to 40 years. That's half of it's natural life span. Balance deleted