Our floor finishers just stained about 3000 sq ft of hardwood in our new home yesterday. It's a dark stain and there are streaks everywhere! So bad that I'm sure that it will have to be sanded off and redone. Does anyone have any advice? I can't believe these finishers didn't see the problem and stop. The stain dried pretty fast so that's probably the problem but what do we do now?

I think that's always a danger with the darker stains. Just out of curiousity, what brand and color stain was it? Typical stains don't dry terribly quickly. I think the Bona FastDri (sp?) ones are quicker to do so.

Regardless, if it's dry now already, I think you have 2 options. Retry the staining procedure or sand off the stain.

What kind of wood is the floor? If it's maple, then that's the reason behind the difficulty in even staining.

Double staining the floor is a problem waiting to happen. Once the poors of the wood are filled with pigment thats all thats going in there any additional will just sit on top and create a heck of a bonding issue. You can only fill a glass so full... If it is the bona drifast you may be able to salvage, bonas stain is self desolving meaning he could go in with a buffer and pad a little stain and try to work it out bout a 50 50 imo. Sounds like a case of end user picking out stains for there floor guy to experiment with. Seen it happen to to many nice guys out there. word to the wise dont let people talk you into using something you dont have confidence and experince using or you could be resanding a floor for nothing like this guy probally will. Just ask Gary about his job with the miricle wood filler.

I guess one of the questions would be if the pores were indeed filled and was the initial application evenly done? But, depending on the urethane to be used, a dark oil stain may be problematic anyway with water based finishes.

I'd be very sure that the stain is allowed to completely dry before urethaning it. Peeling would seem to be guaranteed otherwise.

Can you get pictures up?
What kind of wood is it?
Did the water pop it?

Steel wool could help, but need to SEE what exactly you are talking about. And when you are staining, you pretty much cant stop in the middle. That is a recipe for disaster unless there is a break point somewhere. That is proboblay why they didnt stop.

More information from you will help us help you

The head guy for the flooring company came this morning and within less than 5 minutes said they were going to sand it all off and start again with a different stain. The problem arose when we wanted the same color as our cabinets and we told him what it was. That stain was not meant for floors as it dries too fast--he should have known that. At least the poor guys putting the stain on the floors should have said something immediately when it wasn't working as it was supposed to. In any event, it will be sanded off and a Minwax applied. We were just told that they will have to put a thin coat of poly on before they can sand it as the stain will gum up their sanders. I hope that's correct. This is not the first problem we have had with this company as they did the tile as well but that's another story. Thanks so much to all who have replied and tried to help. These forums are wonderful and it's so nice to have a place to ask questions. I'll let you know what happens when it's all over.

Oh, one more thing, we have asked to use Waterlox instead of poly as the sealer. I remember my dad using that on the floors of the houses he built in the 1950s, but no one around here has used it. We were fortunate to talk to the owner of the company in Orlando at the Nat'l Hombuilders Show in February. It's been around for over 90 years. Waterlox is a tung oil and resin finish and is supposed to wear well without many of the problems of poly. It's been used in the White House and a room in the Canadian Parliament so it does have some credentials as well. Just wondering if anyone has used it and what their experience might be. Thanks again.

Your issue might easily be fixed by buffing the floor with a polish pad or carpet with some paint thinner.
As far as putting a coat of poly on the floor first that doesnt make any sense to me. Its definitely easier and less time consuming just to start sanding.

Yep, Waterlox. Some love it, others hate it. It has it's pros and cons like most things. It will be MORE maintenance but the maintenance will be more user friendly/easier. It scuffs easier but recoats easier. It seals well and protects from moisture well. But so do most modern floor finishes. It stinks real bad. But so does acid cure, moisture cure and most OMU's. IMHO, it is over rated and expensive. If I wanted to pay that much for floor finish, I'd choose the best waterbornes ( Traffic, Street Shoe, IDRO 2K, etc.) OR Bacca-Glitza acid curing.

The floor contractor has sanded off the old stain and reapplied it with Red Oak Minwax. They did a good job of sanding off the old stain so there shouldn't have been a problem with the new stain. I have, however, found areas where there is some overlap, some areas that are blotchy and it appears that a lot of the area looks like some kind of "puddling" or "pooling" but I'm sure that's not actually the case. It looks like some kind of residue. Is it possible to remove excess stain where it overlaps and to fill in areas where it didn't get enough stain? How about the residue? There are several areas where it looks like a large-arc curved swipe was done with less stain. Can't figure that one out. They also did something very strange (at least to us). They sprayed the whole floor with alcohol before applying the stain saying that it would hold the color better or make it a bit darker. I'm wondering if that is the cause of the above problems? If we had had anything to do with hiring the floor finisher, we would NOT have hired these people! Any input and/or recommendations would be greatly appreciated. I certainly hope they don't have to sand this off again. We've been working on our retirement home for nearly two years (16 months in construction now) and since it's around $2 million, we didn't expect to have such a problem with poor quality work.

They did that to "pop the grain" which allows the wood to take the stain somewhat better.

Some floor finishers are just not as good as others. Wiping off stain after it is applied needs to be done right and it's not difficult but if you do not do it properly and with a good eye to the detail, it can have a non-uniform appearance. All you can do is bring it up to the business owner's attention and ask what can be done. Some stains are self dissolving and are easier to repair.

is this an oak floor? Sounds like it might be something else because if they poped the grain and still had trouble after resanding it once souds fishey.

Yes, it is a red oak floor and there is about 3500 sq ft of it. The head of the company was here today and he's meeting with the head installer tomorrow to work out what can be done. The lower level looks to be pretty good with the exception of the "puddling" or whatever one might call it. That may all go away once the Waterlox is put on it. I'm more concerned with the swipes and blotchy appearance of it on the upper level in the great room and dining room.

This problem along with the lousy painting has left us somewhat depressed about this place. This is the sixth house we've built and I grew up in a family of builders so I've been around it all my life. We have the best builder in the area (northern suburb of Atlanta) and he's willing to do whatever it takes to make us happy. He has a great reputation for that. Thanks for all the input.

Was the floor sanded and prepared properly for stain? Some people just cannot sand a floor good enough to produce a good stain job.

The alcohol will raise the grain but how even can one spray alcohol on a oak floor? The grain must be raised very evenly across the floor for the stain to have an even look.

We're not experts on floor sanding so we can only go by what we saw and it looked okay to us. There were a few areas that LOOKED like it could have used a little more sanding but it could have been just the grain of the wood.

Is it possible to get a good "repair" job by adding some stain to areas that are too light or removing some stain where it is overlapped? We can wipe our hands over the stain now and it comes off on our hands. Is this normal? I would have thought that this would have been wiped off when they wiped the stain. I think they wiped it on with rags and wiped it off with some small terry towels. There were about 4 or 5 guys doing it in different parts of the house. I think part of their problem is that they started both times very late in the day and then worked until after dark with just artificial light to see. My thinking is that they should have started first thing in the morning when they weren't tired and in a hurry to get done. They should also be able to see better in natural daylight as the house is very light and open.

Sidebar....


The room is the 5,000-square-foot reading room floor of the Library of Parliament. Built in the mid-1800s. It was totally restored including the 25,000 pieces of oak, cherry and walnut parquet flooring used to recreate the original floor. Pictures don't do it justice.