Hardwood Patching / Refinishing

Over the weekend, I finished up the last time sensitive project that I had to complete. The original hardwood floors downstairs needed to be refinished, but before we could do that there was some patching to do.

The wall moving and a suspected dog stain meant two high traffic areas needed to be patched. There was also a hole in the closet, likely from the original floor plan being modified that needed a few boards to patch as well.

The first step was removing all the cut pieces around the area where the wall was in the now hallway. I used a circular saw to cut the pieces where they disappeared under the tiled bathroom floor and then a pry bar and hammer to pull them out as intact as possible.

Many of the pieces were unusable due to excessive nail or screw holes from the carpet or the closet hardware. Salvageable pieces I pulled the nails out and cut the ends square so they could be reused.

I ended up needing 20 more square feet to patch the blank areas. I could only find one local hardwood dealer that carried unfinished red oak flooring which naturally cost more than the prefinished Bruce oak that we are installing in the rest of the house. Having now installed both the prefinished and unfinished I can see the quality is much higher in the unfinished. The lack of the v-groove is also very nice. Since the floor has not been finished yet I don't know for sure, but it seemed to me that the unfinished floor will turn out much nicer than the pre-finished.

The dog stain area was a PITA to patch as it was in the middle of the floor. More than one flooring person who came to quote our job told us that it would have to be patched, that it was likely the stain was deep in the wood. I thought about sanding it down a bit and checking before patching but never got around to it. When I cut the old boards out I could immediately see that they did not need to be ripped out. By then it was too late and they were in pieces. The dog stain had not penetrated at all into the wood. Nuts.

Before and after pictures of the hallway. The after is only sanded, with no finish yet. I am amazed at how well the old and new wood blends.