Hardwood Buff and Coat

[wcheaib]

Hello I am so happy I found this site. I recently bought a house that has oak, finished on-site hardwood and I am looking to do a buff and coat (no resanding) before moving in. The house was built in 2007 and the hardwood is simply in need of a refresh. I have attached some pictures. The existing finish is an oil-based polyurethane. I have had a few hardwood contractors come in and they seem to all recommend a different approach - oil vs. water poly. I had one contractor claim the BONA Traffic HD is by far the best finish and can be applied over oil giving excellent results. On the other hand, I have had other contractors claim that water over oil results in poor adhesion and cracking down the road and to stick with an oil finish. Can someone help me out on this as I am not sure who to believe? I know that water-based poly has lower VOCs, virtually no odour and dries quicker to allow for a shorter period of time to be away from the house. In my case, I will not be living there for a few weeks. I just want to go with the best solution. Thanks for your help.

 

[EliteFloors]

Hello, u definitely have a beautiful home. As a floor finisher, there are so many things that u have to consider. What has been used on the floor in the past and what will bond and give u the best results & of course if u just purchased the home, u have no idea. The Bona is a great product. Personally I prefer polo plaz oil based finish. Either way u will b fine as long as they use a bonding agent since there is no telling what in the floors currently. I had a bad experience re coating a floor where the cleaning lady used a citrus based cleaner & the only thing that work was the water based material. Hope this helps a little at least. Btw never go with the cheapest bid u get!!

 

[wcheaib]

So I ended up having a contractor do a Buff and Coat for my dining room only with an oil based poly (Bona Woodline Satin). He messed up the room. There are white lines between about a dozen hardwood planks. He essentially removed some of the stain from the hardwood as he was buffing it. His excuse was the floor was uneven and this was inevitable. I have attached some pictures. Needless to say I am off to a really bad start in getting my floors done. I am just happy I did not get him to do the whole house.

Can this be fixed or do I need to have the whole room sanded? Thank you.

 

[Nick]

Love those stairs . It can be fixed . I would go with the oil if you are only doing a screening and recoat .

Ask to see some photos of the next contractors work .

Good luck with the new house .

 

[DennisT]

If the floor was uneven and this was inevitable then he should have warned you beforehand. If he didn't then he's trying to avoid stepping up for his mistake.

 

[Nick]

He aloso could have flatten the floor .

 

[wcheaib]

Thanks for your replies. How do you go about finding a decent/honest hardwood contractor if you're not in the business? Unfortunately, a lot of the online reviews are done by family and friends.

 

[Floorist]

Stay away from Angie's list. That site is totally dishonest.

 

[wcheaib]

I live in Toronto and the guy I found was on Homestars. He had a bunch of reviews with 10/10 ratings. I figured I couldn't go wrong, but that didn't work out.

 

[DennisT]

That's a million dollar question. Probably the best method is get references and then check them out closely. Keep in mind that everyone has different expectations. So what one person may feel is a fantastic job another will be very unhappy.

So by checking them out closely you should actually go and see the finished product.

Angie's/google/yelp rating sites are of some use, but with different expectations you can't take the ratings too seriously.

 

[wcheaib]

I found a guy who does the buffing by hand as opposed to machine. He swears by it. He thinks the reason I had lousy results was because the machine simply took off the stain on the raised wood plank and you would not have this if the floor was sanded by hand. I hope this works.

 

[Nick]

You wouldn't have it if the guy new how to sand a floor.
I hold part payment till the end and i see how it comes out .

 

[EliteFloors]

Well he didn't want to full sand the floor from what I read. Just asked for a screen & coat. U would have been better off to either leave the floor alone or do a full refinish since looking at what u have was most likely pre-finished

 

[EliteFloors]

Or the only other thing u must have is a crowned, or cupped wood floor. Best to sand it down and completely refinish it since it wasn't flat. Therefore the buffer went right through the finish & stain

 

[wcheaib]

The floor was actually originally finished on-site. I agree it is cupped, but you would think out of the half dozen contractors that came in, they would recommend against a screen and coat if it was going to remove the stain. Not one of them suggested I do a sanding. They all noticed the floor was not perfectly smooth but thought it was in decent shape and that a screen and coat was all that was needed to get it looking almost new again.

The guy that did my dining room should have noticed that the stain was being removed as he was buffing and either stopped or try to reapply the stain before applying a new coat of urethane. Luckily I didn't get the whole house done or then I would likely have had to resand everything. I have another guy coming in tomorrow to redo the dining room. He claims he does all buffing by hand and this is the best method for uneven floors (who knows). I will test him out and hopefully he can fix it.

 

[EliteFloors]

Good deal. Hopefully he can take care of the issues. What finish does he use?!

 

[EliteFloors]

From the pic where the stain was gone it either looked like pre finished with the over-under wood. Or maybe your floors are crowned since the stain is missing in the middle of the board but not on the edges. At any rate hand sanding should be better in either case!! It's hard as a floor finisher to not just say lets go ahead and refinish this!!

 

[EliteFloors]

Well we all figure u got everything all taken care of since we haven't heard anything bad about the last crew that was out?! Feel free to give an update. Thanks, Tim

 

[wcheaib]

I just moved in today. I had 2 polish guys come in and they sanded the floors by hand. It took them a day and a half to get through the whole house (4,400 sf). They did a great job. So much so that I paid them $1.20 psf as opposed to their original quote of $1.00 psf. The only complaint I have is that I wish I had taped the baseboards to avoid the yellowing from the urethane. In any case, I touched them up and moved in today. Thanks for all your helpful comments.

 

[EliteFloors]

Great. Glad everything worked out for you!