Hi. I'm looking for some quick advice on what is acceptable and what we should do. We just had our mixture of white and red oak floors refinished by a contractor. He is still coming to the job site because there was a miscommunication about wanting flush mount vents installed. However, the floors are done and cured. Here's the two problems:

1. I just discovered that the edges around the baseboard trim, which the contractor convinced me not to remove because he has a great edging tool, are really rough in many sections. The rough section runs from 1/4" to 1/2" out from the baseboard trim. In addition, the trim transition pieces between the floors are very rough. My first worry is that these sections did not get finish applied to them and are unprotected. My husband assured me that they did or they would not match the rest of the floor. Now I'm worried that dust and debris may get trapped in the very small crevices because it isn't smooth and maybe it will be hard to run the Bona cleaning or dusting pad over the rough area. Should I be worried or is this acceptable in the trade? If I should have it fixed, what would it take to fix it properly?

2. Admittedly we have three dogs. That said, I don't remember this being an issue last time our floors were refinished and I even got on my hands and knees to inspect the floor. Yes I know that's not a view that's considered acceptable. At any rate, we noticed two medium length pieces of dog hair trapped in the finish right in front of the dishwasher. Our concern is, will they eventually work their way out of the finish and when they do leave a small break in the finish right where there's a higher amount of moisture? If yes, what can or should be done at this point?

Thank you for your advice!

Speak with the man who performed the work and discuss your concerns..he is the only one who is going to fix it if there is something wrong.

without seeing exactly what you are speaking and the degree of the issue there is nothing that can be said.

if the finish is rough it is correctable.

Hi,

Regarding #1: It seems like the contractor uses a pad on the front of his edger to keep him from bumping and damaging the baseboard. He may have got closer to the baseboards in some areas than others. This can cause it to feel a bit "rougher" if he didn't get close during the "fine" sanding. He should have used something like a 40-grit to start and 80-grit to smooth over. An area the edger could not reach, you must scrape by hand with sharp scrapers. This is where it likely feels "rough." Some guys tend to dig into the wood if the scrapers aren't held and used properly.

Scrapers are also very commonly used on thresholds and again, this is likely why it feels rougher. If his scraping was done poorly, this could be the culprit. You may even be able to see small scraper marks if you catch in the right light. I'm sure he coated it with new poly, but probably didn't sand smooth enough before applying and now feels rough.

#2. Dog hairs are a floor refinishers worst nightmare. If 3 dogs reside in the house, it's nearly impossible to keep hairs from settling in the finish. Even if he was to make sure no hairs got in while coating, they could settle into the finish after he left.

You could likely remove the hair with your fingernail assuming it fell into the final coat and not one of the first coats. But doing this would require a buff/and re-coat of the entire board. I would recommend living with the hair because re-coating one board in front of the dishwasher could be very noticeable. I don't think the hair will work itself out of the finish on its own and if it does maybe then I would consider re-coating the entire board over.

Best of luck to you!

Dustin Deslauriers
Everwood Flooring

Thank you for your advice! We did speak with the contractor last night although I was hoping for feedback prior to that so that I was educated. As expected he said that he had to hand scrape along the baseboard trim because his tools couldn't get that close and so the finish being rough is normal and expected. He did agree that one of the transition pieces was too rough and will be sanding better and recoating. The whole thing frustrates me because I was leaning towards having him remove the baseboard trim and he talked me out of it. If this rough area resided under the trim then I wouldn't care. So my last question is are there potential problems with leaving it rough and what would it take to correct the problem?

For the dog hair he is going to be taking a razor blade and shaving off the dog hair. He said it will hardly be noticeable after he's done. I hope that doesn't cause more problems.