My husband and I began our house renovation journey about six months ago and are finally to the wood floor stage. Several of my family members had bought utility grade from lumber liquidators and didn't have a problem, so I thought nothing of purchasing 4" red oak from them. The install went fast even though we had a lot of waste. We have been sanding and filling all of the imperfections and knots. Finally thought we had them all and were ready for the finish. We went through all the steps of sanding... finishing with a 120 before putting down the bonasealer. Then we applied one coat of bonatraffic. The coloring looks awesome and most of the floor is good, but we noticed a couple pieces have splits about a 1/16th of a inch gap between lifted piece and floor and there's some spots with raised grain. Also a couple spots where the wood itself is flaking/peeled up. Of course it's right in the entry and in the hallway. HELP! My husband is threatening carpet now if we can't fix this. I read online to try and super glue the edge back down and then continue finishing (Has anyone tried this? will super glue affect finish later?) Also, read to sand/buff out stuff. My husband thought to gouge out the split areas and then fill.... if we go this route, do we have to put sealer over the new fill or can you continue with finishing from where we are at? He is also wondering if we need to resand everything and start over? What is your experience or how can we fix this? I'm near tears and sick to my stomach. We have been working so hard to get our home done, so we can move in. I'm not at the house now, but I'll take some pictures and post as soon as I can. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! He's ready to go buy carpet and I absolutely do not want it. The good parts of the floor look awesome!

First, lets remove the tears and fears.
It's a flor.

secondly, to answer your question, the splintering and "flaking/peeling" is what
I like to call "leafing"

its a thin veneer of the top surface of the flooring that comes up with the introduction of waterbased finish..that's because there is water in the finish. it swells, then comes up.


You can take some carpenter glue and spread it over the damage and be sure to get it under the lifted edges.

clean the surface off with damp rag, weight it down with something flat and heavy. You can also use tape, but I prefer weight.

give it a half hour or so.

same for the splintered edges.
Cutting them out and filling is not a problem.

You don't need the sealer, but why not use it?