Old Painted Pine
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Old painted pine wide boards, click here to see the before and after pictures the transformation is truly amazing!
Red Oak Bleached white stain - 6 coats of Water base finish
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These are 2 ¼" wide red oak hardwood floors. They were previously bleached and stained white over 10 years ago. The floors were sanded, bleached twice stained with one coat of white stain and finished with two coats of water base sealer and four coats of water base polyurethane. The job took 13 days to complete. It's a very time consuming process. The bleaching through the last coat alone took 8 days, however, the floor came out excellent and the customer was very pleased.
Oak & Maple Parquet
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The oak parquet in these pictures was very challenging to do because if you look closely the floor's grain is running in different directions so the sanding technique is critical, otherwise you will ruin the beautiful floor. The other factor with this particular floor was it is very thin and reaquired a very delicate touch.
The maple flooring is very beautiful because it has 100 years of petina. As the wood ages is becomes darker. When this was installed it was almost as white as the new maple you would see today at the lumber yard. However, after 100 years of natural aging the flooring looks incredible. You cannot duplicate this look by using stains, so sanding a floor like this needs to be done with much care because it is so old. This floor was at the end of it's life cycle, however, with much care it was able to be resanded one last time using the proper techniques and care.
Old Painted Fir & Oak
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This was also a very difficult job. As you can see, the fir floor was in terrible shape. The floor was covered with paint and in need of some repair. The home-owner was remodeling the room and wanted to have a beautiful floor. The plywood you see was also fir, so we used the wood we removed there to repair all the holes and damaged pieces in the room. We had just enough wood to make it like new. The beauty of this is it matched perfectly because even though the pictures show a very light and bright fir, there is still 100 years or more of petina in this wood. Buying and using new fir would not have matched up as well nor would it have looked as nice.
The other room and the hallway were also in tough shape as the pictures show. There were some extensive stains in the opening, most likely from pets. I always tell my customers what they can expect and I told him those stains may not be able to be removed. However, these floors had only been sanded once, so I was able to aggresively sand those areas adn remove 99% of the stains. The customers were extremely pleased with the results, and as you can see I was able to transform the room just by revealing the beauty held under the paint.
Prefinished White Oak Floor
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This is a kitchen-family room adjoined. The kitchen had ceramic tile and the family room was carpeted. The home-owner decided to remove the rug and tile and discard it to save some money. However, there was an issue with some cement left behind that was under the tile. Taking out the plywood to level out the floor was not an option so I, using a sanding edger, sanded off all the cement, even under the toe kicks and base board heating! This gave us a beautiful sub-floor to bring it back tight to the floor joists to avoid squeaks. This particular wood is a 3 ¼" prefinished white oak floor that you can not buy at Home Depot or Lumber Liquidators. It has 10 coats of a Dural luster finish and is very durable. If you don't mind the eased edge of a prefinished floor, it has a lot of benefits. Once it is installed you are ready to move right in. The finish is already cured when the flooring comes out of the box and is less susceptible to scratching so you can put it to heavy use right away.
Ash
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New installation of 3 ¼" ash hardwood flooring. Sanded and finished with four coats of oil base polyurethane. Semi-gloss was the last coat. This floor was installed fitting tight to the trim, this is the way hardwood floors were installed for many years. The only place the floor was slid under anything was near the door casings. In New England we have such a long dry season that leaving an expansion is not necessary above grade. I was taught this way by my father, I like to fit tight like this because when the house settles a gap usually forms under the baseboard. Many jobs where they decide to go under the baseboard or to use quarter round molding you end up seeing this gap. Especially in new construction as these houses tend to settle more. Fitting tight may take longer because it requires exact measurments, but the results are certainly worth it. The ash almost resembles an oak grain, however, the wood is much lighter in color.
