If it weren't for the hair....

[Lily left the valley]

I wonder if the varied tones of the spindles of the top of the stairs were always that way?

The stairs look great sans carpet.

Great work developing there. It will all be worth it.

[JRC]

My little brother and his family bought a house that was built in the mid-late 1890's. It has beautiful oak floors and not so beautiful mauve carpet in the center. Under the carpet is plywood! I'm assuming this was a cost saving measure back when the house was built. I'd take unfinished oak over plywood any day!

It was definitely a cost saving measure. In the dining room of my last house, (built in 1915) there was oak around the edge. But, instead of plywood, there was the same pine that they used upstairs, in the middle. It was very splintery, since it was never finished. So, in your brother's case, I wonder if they replaced splintery pine with newer, smooth plywood? I think it would be very unusual to find plywood in a house that old.

I wonder if the varied tones of the spindles of the top of the stairs were always that way?

Hopefully, TexasRed will comment, but that looks like a shadow, to me.

[Mick_VT]

I wonder if the varied tones of the spindles of the top of the stairs were always that way?

I have the faint ghost of two tone staining like that on my bannister

[phil]

My little brother and his family bought a house that was built in the mid-late 1890's. It has beautiful oak floors and not so beautiful mauve carpet in the center. Under the carpet is plywood! I'm assuming this was a cost saving measure back when the house was built. I'd take unfinished oak over plywood any day!

Something is off there because plywood wasn't invented until later than the house was built, so either it's not plywood or it was a later reno I think,, if it's plywood.

you can get a rough idea of the age of plywood by looking at the edge. Nowadays the plys are a lot thinner but the old stuff usually had thicker layers.

when exactly was plywood invented? i dont' see any signs of origianl parts made of my house made of plywood in 1924 but I think it was around in the 30's and maybe earlier but I don't think youlll see it much earlier. someone else may be able to date when plywood started to show up.

if the subfloor is intact then maybe it was laid as normal when the house was built and maybe someone stole the floorboards as part of a depression era or later update? my kitchen had some plywood where stairs had been previously. and they had used it to level the floor and then put lyno.

[phil]

I can't wait to uncover my living room. since I bought it it's had the carpet and the carpet strips. Under that is a jute backed cork material. it has flowers hand painted all over it. Under that is the original fir and I will probably have to pull out the jute backed stuff. the Jute backed stuff could be as old as the house so I don't know what to expect. but the fir seems to have a finish on it so I assume that's original and if I'm lucky they put the cork stuff on early , it might be in nice shape, who knows..

Since I'm drywalling and finishing the walls I might as well wait the old carpet is fine to drip on. . When I do expose the floor I'll have to take more care not to damage it. maybe the jute/cork stuff would fit another room, It would be a shame to see it go to the dump but I assume it's not perfect. it's just like battleship linoleum and kind of neat in itself. If I need a stop-gap before finishing the floor I might leave the jute/cork stuff for a while


That floor will look stunning. I wouldn't hesitate to much to sand if it'll help things match up before refinishing. If they do yours commercially it would be interesting to know If they want to use water based poly.

I'd find out a bit about what it would take to re-coat that W/B stuff. I have heard it's hard to re-coat but I don't know If the water base can be re-coated without removing it all. If so, I'd steer away from that product and towards using just oil or oil then shellac or oil and then oil based poly. if you hire finishers and they want to use W/b then I;d find out more about their products from tech support of that particular brand and I wouldn't act on the finishers recommendation without checking on your own. You don't want ot end up with a floor that needs to be sanded back to wood in order to do touch ups. that might be fine in a new installation but not your 100 year old floor. commercial finishers may say they will only use water based. Just be aware and don't' get "convinced" into using a product you can't refinish just to save them from needing to work with stuff that will be stinky for a few days.

if you have the choice to go with an oil based polyurethane it may not block the UV as much as the water based stuff and then the floors continue to darken from sunlight. Its worth knowing if the finish you choose will allow the wood to darken or if it will stop this from happening because of UV blockers in the coating. myself I'd want them to continue to darken naturally after finishing.

I wouldn't use stain it'll just hid the grain. I'd use tinted oils and amber shellac or tinted poly maybe to get them a little bit darker. I'd d really think about what you want before you go put stain on your bare wood floor. Paint would be easier to remove and I wouldn't do that either.

It's about what YOU want though, and what matches your home. It looks like you have some nice features. Maybe stain is the thing, it's just not something you can do and undo so I'd consider it damaging unless it's really what you want. If you were to do a clear shellac coat and a few coats of amber that could come off if you mess up or don't like it but the only thing that takes stain off is sandpaper. You can only sand so many times. you could do an oil coat and then a few more coats of slightly tinted oil. then you can build more color in stages with your choice of finish.
even if you give it to commercial finishers I;d explore the products and then tell the finishers what you want rather than the reverse. I think in some cases people see the darkened wood ( from age, dirt accumulations, UV exposure, and amber shellac the wood may appear quite dark but may not have ever been stained and i think sometimes people jump to the conclusion that things have been stained that never were.

You can build the darkness in stages. some of the stains that go onto bare wood can go on streaky and you don't want issues like that , Just be careful. I'm not saying not to use them just experiment first.

in some cases people are sealing the wood and then putting pigment based stains over that. If you do this maybe you do have whatever you sealed with to protect the wood fibers from becoming saturated with stain but also any pigments that are put on top of the wood hide the grain. personally every time I have tried wiping stains like this I give up and find it disappointing that I can't seem to get rid of the streaky marks from wiping. another approach is to spray the stain (or die) in order to get uniform coverage. it's like a thin coat of semi transparent paint.

it's possible to color correct a floor but it might be difficult to get an exact match. easier to sand it all if there is no issue with the thickness. Maybe if you use some lacquer thinner as a test you can see if you can remove it or if the dark perimeter is stain that's driven deep into the pores of the wood.
If you wet the floor with a damp cloth you'll immediately see something a little closer to what the floor will look like with a finish on it. I think you'll have a hard time making the center match the perimeter without sanding, but if it turns out to be just a dark shellac or something and not a stain, you might be lucky.

in some homes of that age they used ammonia to fume oak and this can also be mistaken as a stain. in early days they would sometimes finish the whole interior and put ammonia in there to darken the woodwork. this isn't done today because of the obvious dangers of poisonous ammonia gas but it's is a common finish for early quartersawn oak. what you have there appears painted on. Hopefully someone didn't just stain the edges.

do you think the unfinished flooring is original? to me it doesn't look like the bannister is stained , it looks like it is a lot lighter where it's scratched indicating maybe some darkness was in the finish such as an amber shellac.

you can use stains and dies and fuming to darken wood. these methods soak into the grain of the wood and some stains enhance the grain while others contain pigments that cover the wood and hide it. also any topcoat may have pigments in it. As you put pigments over the wood you hide the grain and you will not see the luster and ribbon of the wood. Sometimes you can build these pigments in the finish so light can still go through and show the wood but if they become too dark you end up with wood where you can hardly see the grain , it gets muddy.

There are some dies that don't do this so much but different chemicals react with different species in different ways. I try to use clear oil first, then slightly darkened oils if I want some color correction and then you can put stains into your topcoat. If you lay that heavy pigment down on top of your wood then you can have a dark floor that looks like wood but has lost all it's ribbon and luster. when you see antiques that are finished nicely often it looks like you can see right into the wood and it has an almost holographic look to it. the light will sort of dance as you view it through different angles as you walk by. There is a real science to finishing as there are just so many options and It's best if you experiment first. try some scraps, try to mix your putty to math so when you put your finish on the putty it matches the wood with the finish on it. If you fill nail holes or some cracks with utty you want a really good match and you can loosely blend the putty so it's not too uniform.

If you hire finishers I'd be really cautious you don't get a team of kids in there that don't know or don't care about your floors and who just want to get out and make a buck. You are much better to hire someone with experience and if they are not able to discuss different options properly and if they just tell you everyone uses the same water based stuff that would be the kind of warning that would me lean towards thinking maybe they aren't the guys you need.

I love the craftsman style bannister It doesn't look super dark. it looks like you have some fir in there as well as the oak. both fir and oak have tannins and if you look near nails you may see how the iron has reacted from the tannins to leave black marks near the nails. it's a chemical reaction between the iron and the tannins.

looking at the floor I'd say it looks like a lot is sort of edge grain and turns to flat grain across the board, maybe this is indicative of the way it was cut from the log, maybe quartersawn? does all the house have oak flooring?

one thing I did was to put the oil firs to try to harden the floor , it soaks in under the wood surface and this makes it tougher. i used poly and it's ok but one thing I would say is the finish doesn't make the wood hard, so because fir is soft it can still dent almost as easily. You might do the same and oak is much harder so that wouldn't be such an issue.
I also think theere are valid points in using only oil or only shellac. It's a matter of what you prefer.

poly is really hard wearing. it has been around since the 1930s or so it isn't a new product. Many like it because you don't have to finish the floor often , it can take some abuse. If you go with oil you can re-coat it every year or so and that's nice too and many like shellac and that may be original. they all have benefits. If you do like 10 coats of oil over a period of time It can be really nice too.

I'd have a go at trying to remove that dark stain or whatever it is and see if you can put some dainish oil or blopentine on it. If you can get the dark stuff off and just use oil maybe you don't need a refinish. If you find it's stain that's driven in I think you'll have to sand it. I don't think a coat or two of oil would make much difference , if you break out the sander it'll be down to clean wood if you have the thickness. so you'd still have that option.

I have seen fake veneer done with stains, they can be carefully applied to localized areas and that can be done with some interesting effects. I guess another option is leaving the perimeter darker and trying to make it look like it's intentional.. what if you did an ebony border to cover the rough line, and inside that refinished the unfinished part in a third color?

[TexasRed]

I wonder if the varied tones of the spindles of the top of the stairs were always that way?

The stairs look great sans carpet.

Great work developing there. It will all be worth it.

Thank you Lily. The "carpet-be-gone" made a huge difference. The house is starting to look like it's supposed to.

We hope to live long enough to finish and just enjoy the house. (I know one is never "finished" though)

As to the stair spindles; I think what everyone is seeing in the pic is just shadows / sunlight. The wood tone is consistent (more or less for old wood) throughout the whole banister.

[TexasRed]

>>> Phil Thank you for your knowledgable reply on the flooring. Whoee, you brought up a lot of good points. So now I have some questions & thoughts..

First, several people have mentioned OAK - does it look like I have oak floors instead of pine? I'm trying to learn to identify wood species - it takes an educated eye like you have. And yes, the wood floors are the same upstairs and downstairs.

We believe the original dark finish shown is tinted shellac. When I was scraping the hair, I was able to chip the finish off down to bare wood in a few spots. It seemed rather brittle...leading me to think shellac or perhaps varnish.

I really, really do not want poly. I want a finish that can be touched up without stripping again. I'm liking your suggestion of using oil for the floors. We were leaning toward shellac - would need to experiment with different tints (amber, garnet etc.) to get the color we desire. Maybe both (oil, then shellac) is the best way to go.

>>> Does anyone think treating the unfinished wood with blopetine would help the floor accept the finish more evenly?

I assumed the floors would need a light sanding before any finish coat. Maybe this would also help with the evenness of the final color?!? The existing border could probably just be removed with denatured alcohol, there is just a lot of area to do.

Today we got the name of a great refinishing company from a neighbor (so he says). They are from a nearby town. (Did I mention I moved to a small town? ) Haven't interviewed him yet. I'll have to see previous work before I turn someone loose with a sander and shellac. We are pretty picky and very protective of these floors.

Thanks again Phil. I appreciate your input very much.

[lovesickest]

This site is from the UK and has many photos of refinished old floors. This business uses shellac as an integral part of the process - whether as the first coat sealer on bare wood, before wood is stained or doing a shellac and wax finish:

http://newellwoodworks.co.uk/FLOOR%20ST ... llery.html

This place is in the US and has a sympathetic approach to restoring old floors, again with shellac or Tung Oil Varnish:

http://www.shenandoahrestorations.net/wood-floors/

Neither are in Texas but they may help to give you an idea of what is possible ?

[JRC]

>>> Phil Thank you for your knowledgable reply on the flooring. Whoee, you brought up a lot of good points. So now I have some questions & thoughts..

First, several people have mentioned OAK - does it look like I have oak floors instead of pine? I'm trying to learn to identify wood species - it takes an educated eye like you have. And yes, the wood floors are the same upstairs and downstairs.

We believe the original dark finish shown is tinted shellac. When I was scraping the hair, I was able to chip the finish off down to bare wood in a few spots. It seemed rather brittle...leading me to think shellac or perhaps varnish.

I really, really do not want poly. I want a finish that can be touched up without stripping again. I'm liking your suggestion of using oil for the floors. We were leaning toward shellac - would need to experiment with different tints (amber, garnet etc.) to get the color we desire. Maybe both (oil, then shellac) is the best way to go.

>>> Does anyone think treating the unfinished wood with blopetine would help the floor accept the finish more evenly?

I assumed the floors would need a light sanding before any finish coat. Maybe this would also help with the evenness of the final color?!? The existing border could probably just be removed with denatured alcohol, there is just a lot of area to do.

Today we got the name of a great refinishing company from a neighbor (so he says). They are from a nearby town. (Did I mention I moved to a small town? ) Haven't interviewed him yet. I'll have to see previous work before I turn someone loose with a sander and shellac. We are pretty picky and very protective of these floors.

Thanks again Phil. I appreciate your input very much.

I know this post was mostly directed to Phil, but I hope you'll take another look at my first reply to your original post. I want to clarify a few things.

The photo I shared was from one of the upstairs bedrooms. I know it's a bad photo for seeing detail, (cell phone pic) but the wood looked very similar to what you have; not oak, but probably some kind of pine. (disclaimer: with me being in Ohio, and you in Texas, the exact species may very well be different, which may really change how the floor takes a finish)

I had oak floors on the first floor, and they definitely looked different from your floor, and what I had on the second floor.

I sanded the floor in the picture by hand, with a belt sander. So, while not as aggressive as one of those big stand-up belt sanders, still more aggressive than a palm sander. (my aunt actually did a number of floors with just one of those ) If you hire a professional, I'd be sure they were very careful about using one of those big sanding machines. While old pine is a lot harder than modern pine, it's still a softer wood.

Also, in my case, the wood around the edges, that was originally finished, was lighter than the center, after sanding everything. Since it was never sealed, the wood in the middle was able to oxidize, and darkened/yellowed more. I don't know how deep the color difference went, and maybe an aggressive sanding would make a difference? But, you have to be careful with that, because there are a limited number of times a t&g floor can be sanded.

I was surprised at how much the wood darkened with the shellac. (the color didn't change with the 2nd 3rd and 4th coats, it only became glossier) I used clear shellac: "Bulls Eye Sealcoat Universal Sanding Sealer." I wouldn't be surprised if they just used clear shellac, originally, and it darkened with age. But, maybe they did add color, IDK? I think, if you sand a bare spot, (in an out-of-the-way location) and wipe on just denatured alcohol, you can get an idea of what the color of clear shellac will look like, and judge for yourself.

[Lily left the valley]

I don't recall where I found this, but here is a reference image I grabbed when I was trying to learn wood types.

Since this is a 3rd party source that I can't even remember how to find, I can't guarantee how accurate it is.



Oh, and I forgot about this site, it's a reclaimed place. Pics for each type.

http://www.reclaimedantiquewoods.com/en-us/aboutus.aspx