Hardwood flooring - how to finish around curved areas

croftca

I have just had hardwood flooring installed. I have a hearth that comes out about 3 feet from the wall. It is not even on the edges and it is rounded at the two front corners. The installed put "plastic" quarter round and it looks very bad. In fact, it has already split at the edge. How does one finish off hardwood when there are uneven edges or curves that it must butt up to?

Thanks.

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NateHanson

You can have a woodworker or finish carpenter make a curved quarter round for your application. Unless the installer specified plastic trim in their contract, I think I'd try to get THEM to pay for a suitable fix.

scorrpio

Several techniques exist.
Steam-bending where wood is bathed in hot steam for a while, and then is bent around a form.

Bent-lamination is not likely to work here.

Another way is to create corners from solid wide board rough-cutting outer side first, fine-cutting on a router, profiling it, and then rough-cutting inside on a bandsaw and cleaning up on a router.

NateHanson

I'm not sure why bent lamination wouldn't work there, but anyways, I was imagining option three for this guy. Cut the corners from solid stock, since it would look best.

scorrpio

Actually bent lamination IS viable. You simply need to rip individual strips to varied width so they approximate the quarter-round - then routing a profile should not cause a distortion.

Jeekinz

A quick and easy solution would be a 90 deg mitred corner with a triangular fill block having one side match the curve of the stone.

NateHanson

Why not just make a lamination to the right shape, and then cut the quarter round profile on a router or shaper? Same as cutting a roundover on any curved edge. You'd want a simple jig to hold it, but otherwise, no problems.

Steam bending is ok, but it's more work for a single piece like this, and that's a pretty tight bend for steaming.

mallord

It is not easy to tell from the pics if the floor is the same height as the stone. If the stone is higher than the floor was it possible to undercut with masonary blade or diamond grinding wheel? If so the flooring could have slid underneath as around doorways.
I have cut and turned laminate around the rise of a curved stairway but the upper edge was concealed beneath the bullnose (also custom made from teak flooring planks).
It is worth a hefty charge$$.