I am new to floor finishing and I am attempting to finish my lower apartment's floors. I want to do this the correct way, I am not looking for a how-to, I just need help identifying the type of wood my floor is.

History: The old tenant refinished half of the wood floors; I do not know if he just sanded and poly-ed or if he used a stain?? I am trying to finish the rest of the floors. I will attach pictures below also. I need to know if its maple, oak, or some other kind? Also, what should wood should I use if I need to replace any pieces.


Thank You for reading and I hope you can help...

Looks like Oak to me. The finished pics look like it had poly only.

Thanks for the quick reply, can you tell if the new finish is stained or is it just sealed? I have no hands on experience of staining...for now at least. I just want to try to get the rest of the floor to match.

It looks to be oak, and I'd say he sealed it with an oil sealer or neutral stain, not a pigmented stain. You won't know for sure until you actually sand and put some sealer on it, side by side.

I've never used Varathane stains, but they do have an innovation that neither Duraseal or Bona have--Varathane provides little sample packs of their stains, that you can use to try to match an existing color.

If it does turn out to be a stain, I wouldn't worry too much about applying it. A color that light will be fairly forgiving when you spread it on--it won't tend to get lap marks. I was going to say that it won't highlight the scratch marks from sanding as much, either, but any amount of color will bring them out to some degree. You have to scrape and hand-sand more if you're going to stain.

It looks to be just polyed although a natural stain would darken it slightly. Try some poly on a sanded or unfinished piece of flooring. If it needs to be darkened try applying a natural stain under the poly. Depending on the poly product you use you might get slightly different tones.

Thanks so much guys, one more question, how are there darker parts on the floor if its just poly? Do some pieces just soak in darker or is it just due to uneven sanding?

The grain of the oak is responsible for some being light and some being darker. The polyed pictures that you have appear to be the flooring grade referred to as Select and Better which has pieces with more grain/texture/color variations than Clear grade which would be more uniform in grain, texture, and color.

Awesome, thanks for the help guys! I will start sanding and polying when it gets warmer here.