The light colored wood looks like maple, the dark colored could be cherry, hard to tell in the photo. Looks much too red to be oak. Cherry is a hard wood, not quite as hard as maple, if you can scratch it easily with a fingernail it is probably not cherry.
I'm sitting here admiring the craftsmanship that went into installing that floor. I agree with the poly coat, please don't stain it. It is definitely different and I like it.
Wow what a great find... It would kill me to stain that floor if it were in my house but you gotta do what look right. Is there any other similar features in this house you could share with us like built ins, interesting trim or a decorative staircase???
looks like cherry/maple to me.... take a few close ups of some knotty/grained areas and we can tell better.
i think definitely 2 separate wood species though, as sanding would have removed most/all stain.
it also looks like that someone created that floor custom, as i see no butted edges in the planks.
you probably won't find 12'+ planks of flooring in bigbox stores... heh heh
Another vote for cherry and maple. Look at the end of the seventh board from the right, just in front of the waste pipe. Is that a curly grain I see there?
I think I'd go a step beyond ordinary poly and protect that beautiful old craftsmanship with a gym floor finish.
Macros would really help, though. Can't zoom it enough to tell for sure without being too blurred.
Please, you have us all drooling now. Could you possibly post better, maybe macro pictures? This floor is so unique and should be saved- -PERIOD! I consider you very lucky. Thanks, David
If you have a loose sample, weigh it and measure its volume and compare it to the listed densities for dry wood.
Maple is 39 to 47 pounds/cu. ft. = 0.36 to 43 oz/cu. in.
wow, was not expecting such an out burst of enthusiasm. my wife is saying the same sort of things.. but the rest of our house has oak with dark walnut stain. so she prefers the floor a bit darker to go with the flow. she definately loves the floors though!
with this in mind, i went to HD and picked up some pre-tinted dark walnut wood filler and filled any of the old nail holes. see the dark smudge on the white piece of wood, right hand side. i will go over this with a piece of 100grit sand paper so only the nail hole is covered with the wood fill (waiting for it to dry).
here are some close up pictures:
and notice the swirl marks i left with my amateur edger technique... i plan on going over it with 100 grit orbital sander, hand held. i must make these floors look perfect..
Yoyizit , i only had one lose sample and it was old and ugly. i threw it in the garbage and replaced with a piece of oak i got from HD. this was back before i sanded the floors and realized what i had.
otherwise, the floor is solid, nothing lose. each piece is 1" thick, 3" wide and lays directly on the floor joist. it is tounge & gove.
ok.. my wife read this thread and may be swayed! she is now thinking to do a "natural stain" or no stain at all.. just poly.
but i already applied the walnut wood fill.. darn. so, i will go back and hole punch each hole to compress the dark wood fill INTO the wood. then i'll go over it with two different wood fills.. "natual" for the light strips and "mahogany" tinted for the red strips.
what are your suggestions on how to properly finish this floor? what products?
The best I have found is "OldMasters" poly. I prefer the oil based. Excellent self leveling properties, you can just about just slap it on and it levels to a smooth brush mark free finish. It is very durable.
Cherry and maple sound right to me, given the photo. If it was oak, the "pin" characteristics in the grain would "probably" be a give away clue. Please, please, please, do not stain this floor. I HATE it when people stain or (color) paint nice hardwood. Sorry, I'm a purist...
Yup pretty darn sure everyone is right....cherry and maple for sure. DO NOT STAIN! Staining my favorite hardwood-cherry is about as bad as spray painting a new benz with $4 cans from HD. In fact if this beautiful floor gets stained, I believe I have all lost my faith in carpentry and will drop out of the trade forever to work at a burger joint. Please sir...Please help keep me employed. I will chuckle the next time i install an osb subfloor and remember that floor in your home
Please post some updated pics once the floor is polyed
quick question... how do you properly apply poly (say that 3 times fast!).
i am using minmax gloss super fast trying professional poly. it says also on the can that NO SANDING is required (this is why we bought it).
last year on the pine plank 2nd floor of the house we put on poly in thin amounts with a brush. it caused micro-bubbles. but this was the instruction on the can.
then, later we went and did our oak living room floor with the same product. but decided to add more ample amounts per brush to get less bubbles (no idea how we came up with this theory). it worked, went on flawless.
in the kitchen this morning i applied same technique as living room, a lot of poly per brush stroke. and when it dried.. bubbles! ugg... this technique worked for the living room but not the kithen, no idea why. what am i doing wrong?
in the mean time, i will wait 36 hours for poly to dry and rent large square vibrating sander with 220 grit to lightly dust the floor. vacuum/tack it clean, and apply a THIN coat of poly.
Knucklez
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