My timber floor dents - is this normal?

[Evalina]

Hi all!

This is my first post.....please be kind ;). I have a problem with my polished floor, well I think it's a problem. Who knows, it could be completely normal.

I had them sanded and stained quite dark and then polished by a reputable company here in Adelaide almost ten weeks ago. There was supposed to be three coats of a urethane coating over the top, but I'm not sure if that many was actually done. My problem is that I can mark my floor very easily with just a light touch with my fingernail. I am talking almost no pressure here. It indents the floor and it's giving me the :mad:!!!

I had polished floors in my last house, once again urethane, but done by a different company. It was really hard to dent those floors.

Scratches from grit etc I am used to and I use a dust mop on a daily basis, but these indentations are something new to me......it just seems like the floor is too 'soft'. I initially thought the floor needed to cure and would harden up, but this hasn't happened.

Does anyone have any ideas why this is happening? Thanks for your time.

[Gumby]

Hi Evalina and welcome to the forums.

I have a polished floor and the finish on the top is rock hard. I'm not sure what they used but by the sound of yours, it's wrong.

You will get scratches but certainly not from a finger nail!

My floor is about 18 months old. I won't tell you what my son's friend's stiletto heels did to it at his 21st :mad:

[HappyHammer]

Welcome Evalina.

I'm with Gumby my Blue Gum floors in Sydney wouldn't have been scratched by a lightly applied finger nail. Did you have to leave the house when they applied the finish? We overnighted at the in-laws because the smell was so strong.

HH.

[Evalina]

Wow!

Thanks for the quick replies!

My floor is radiata pine, but its been in the house for 35 years.
We did the floors before we moved in, so they were left alone for three days before anyone walked on them, and as for the smell....GOOD GOD!!! It took almost a month for that stench to go, even though I had doors and windows open continuously.......I had a continual headache for all that time.:mad:

I am used to timber floors and stilletos......my last house had a couple of marks on the floor where I forgot to take my shoes off. Never did that again!:rolleyes: however, there was no way I could dent that floor with my fingernail. Spent many an hour scritching paint and stuff off the floors after hubby painted walls.

This floor though, is very dentable........I want to confront the contractor but would like enough information behind me so he doesn't just say ' Not my problem'

Thanks for any help you can give me.

[HappyHammer]

Hmmm, is it something to do with it being pine? Not sure whether the urethane reacts differently versus hardwood, ie absorbs further into the timber? Could just be talking complete crap now of course :o

HH.

[Ianab]

My floor is radiata pine,

Thats pretty soft wood for a floor... I've built some stuff out of it, and yes it dings up pretty easy - I can fingernail mark it :o
Just compared that to a Bluegum cabinet I've just finished, I dont think even stilletos would dent that :cool:
An area of unfinished Matai flooring in my place is still much harder than the finished Radiata.

Yes a good floor coating will make it a bit tougher, but still pretty easy to dent the underlying timber. :(

Cheers

Ian

[Shaun04]

Wait till Larry McCully sees this, im sure he will have an answer as he is a Timber Floor Contractor.

[Larry McCully]

Hi evalina, If the contractor had have used a single pac solvent based polyurathane, then you would have difficulity in scratching it
By the sounds of it the contractor has used a low grade tung oil based coating. Now that is fine but tung oil , even thou it is used a lot on timber floors has a weak durability factor, and can be scrached easlly, And it might only have two coats and not 3 as is standard. You say that you thought it was a urathane coating on it. Can you ring that contractor and ask him what he used on your floor and post back the reply on this forum.

[Larry McCully]

Hi shaunhttp://www.woodworkforums.ubeaut.com.au/images/icons/icon7.gif

[durwood]

Evalina says she thought she had urethane probably because she probably asked for it. Any reasonable paint coating should be better than what she has.

A touch with a finger nail would not leave an indent normally, the clear should be hard enough to improve the resistance to marking of the wood. I would suspect the timber uncoated would be harder than what she describes.

FInd out what what product was used by the contractor and then check with the manufacturer about his product.

There are instruments which can measure hardness of finishes.

I suspect the contractor messed up and used the wrong material or mixed it wrong. Even with the cold weather it should be well and truely hard by now.

[Larry McCully]

Evalina, Question.. Is it only the timber denting when you run your finger nail accross it or does the coating scratch , a dent is not a scratch. Could you please clarify that RFI. (Request for information)

[Extracare]

I polish floors for a living and I can tell you that polyurethane is not very hard. A coat is as thin and not much stronger than glad wrap - without the stretchiness.

Radiata pine will mark easily, the pressure on a fingernail is quite a lot given that it is applied to a very small area (the tip of your nail).

Since the floor has been sanded you have exposed fresh new timber and it will be easy to dent. Also, since the newly sanded floor looks so perfect you will see dents that you wouldn't have noticed previously.

Have a word with your contractor, if he's any good he'll talk you through what is happening, but it doesn't sound abnormal to me.

[glock40sw]

Radiata Pine :( .....God I love real hardwood:D

[Evalina]

HI!

Yep, it's the floor denting, along with the polish. However the polish is not actually scrstching, just denting. Although there are alot more fine scratches on it in 10 weeks than my other floor had on it in three years. It too was radiata pine and I simply did not have this problem.

I didn't have just one coat of urethane, I was supposed to have three. Would it be stronger the more coats you have?

Thanks for your replies. Keep em coming!:)

[Larry McCully]

Ok, Your pine floor will indent as you say. It is one of the softer woods and in the biggining was not intended to get sanded and coated. It was a timber used as a substrate for vynal, lino and carpet. It wasnt untill the early 90s that it came into vogue as a timber to polish. I spent many years in north Queensland sanding hoop pine , which will dent as easly as you are experiencing on your floor. Sharp objects and stellitos are the offenders. However if the coating is scratching easly and you are experiencing a abrassion , then you need to access a number of factors that contribute to the abrassion.
1/ site conditions around the house.ie soil being walked into the floor from shoes.
2/ What type of shoe being worn on the floor.... Work boots school shoes or any shoe that will contain small bit of grit that will cause abrassion.
3/ What type of coating was used on the floor. Different types of coatings have different durability factors. solvent based polyurathanes are the hardest then going down the scale to tung oils. In between are waterbased and phameldihide based and acid based coatings.
4/ What type of dust extraction are you using, check the head on your vacumm, some people use the old carpet vac heads, there is a metal strip on the bottom that loves to scratch coatings, How is the condition of the broom you are using and its softness.
5/ Because it is scratching easly, consider asking everybody to take their shoes of before entering the house.

But i am interested in what the coating and the brand name of it is.

[Larry McCully]

[Tell me about it.

[Extracare]

Great post by Larry. All of these factors play a part in deterioration of your floor.

A good tip is to buy one of those micro-fibre mops. They have a wide flat head and are very easy to sweep around the floor with once or twice a day. You should do high traffic areas as often as possible.

The mop will remove any grit, sand and stones that will soon scratch your floor when someone scuffs a foot across them.

I have seen floors that look brand new after 3 years and the common factor is a no-shoes policy in the house. You simply can't scratch a floor in your socks or moccasins.

[Dusty]

Get someone to have a sqizz.

Radiata Pine is notoriously soft, if you drop something reasonably heavy on it the floor will dent, if you rock back on the rear legs of a dining chair it will dent, if you have some large sheila, in high heels, tottering around all over it drinking Chardonay, it will dent.

However, sticking your thumb or finger nail into it should not dent it. So, the problem doesn't lie in the Pine it's self, it's the coating. After ten weeks with correctly applied urethane (either single or two pack) your floor should be almost glass hard, as far as poking your digits into it.

Me thinks the contractor may of added a flowing, or thining type additive to the coating in an attempt to make it flow and settle better in the cold weather. He might of just been a little heavy handed, which may contribute to a less than tough coating.

[woodsprite]

Had new radiata pine floor boards put down about 15 years ago in our main living area. Sanded them, stained them and then put a 2 pack finish on.The floor is nearly as good now as it was then - apart from a couple of very small areas where chair legs scrape when moved. I wonder if the pine 15 years ago was a bit toughter than it is these days?

We do get some scuff marks from time to time, but nothing serious. I also give the floor - and the big area of cork floor in the other living area - a coat of Selley's (I think) floor restorer stuff. Looks like milk and has the consistency of milk. Mop it on, dries in about 10 minutes, and it puts a really tough gloss finish on the floor. It is self sacrificing, so after maybe 10 weeks or so starts to lose a little of the gloss, but still seems very tough. Works a real treat on the cork floor which is now 10 years old and should have been re-sealed about 5 years ago!

As a side line - our local community hall had a new jarrah floor installed about 12 years ago and the poly finish on it died badly after about 6 months, due to the heavy foot traffic - looked awful. I happen to also clean the hall and for about 2 years could find nothing that would bring back the shine to the floor. Started using this Selley's stuff, and the floor looks better than new. I re-coat every 12 months, and just mopping it every couple of months cleans the floor and brings back the shine.

Good luck with the guy who did your floor - sounds like he may have stuffed it a bit.
Jeff

[Evalina]

Hi!
Thanks for the replies, just got back from visiting my mother in the country and have popped backiin to see what was going on.:D

My floors are actually 35yrs old, the house was built in 1971. So no new wood here. And since I had radiata pine in my last house (built in 1972) and got that polished as well (with a different contractor) and had absolutely no problems with the floor (a couple of scuff marks where the lounge was and that was it in three years), this one is completely different in its lack of durability.
I thought it could be the contractor not putting enough coats on the floor, supposed to be three, but the time the job took it didn't seem long enough to do three coats Took them five days.....two to sand it, punch down the nails etc, one to put on the stain, then supposedly two days to give it three coats of urethane.
Now I know that the contractors spent no more that 3 hours each day for the first two days, then no more than two hours each day on the final three days. I know that because we were in and out of the garage of the property because we were movng stuff , and mowing etc. Is it possible to put three coats on in two days, assuming that you would have to wait for each coat to dry enough to walk on so you could sand down air bubbles and then apply another coat?

Maybe there is a way to do it.......but I don't know. Also, the guys who did my floors arrived in a van with a completely different name to the company we actually called....I assume the company use subcontractors when they need too, perhaps these subcontractors cut a few corners thinking to save some money.

What do you guys think?

[Dusty]

Hi, nowadays contractors are able to apply three coats in one day, so the chances of them putting down three coats over two days is very real. It still doesn't mean they did do three coats. But it's possible.

However, that's still not the problem, even with two coats the final surface still should be hard enough not to be able to dent with your finger nail.

I'm still thinking that the final coat has not cured correctly for some reason or another.

Find out the name of the coating they used, if possible.

[Extracare]

It's only possible to put down 3 coats in a day if you use water based coatings and these aren't as hard-wearing as poly.

Sounds like they maybe used a barrier seal as the first coat and two coats of poly.

Was there a strong smell of thinners? If so, that's polyurethane.

Can you show us photos of the damage?

[Dusty]

It's only possible to put down 3 coats in a day if you use water based coatings and these aren't as hard-wearing as poly.

Sounds like they maybe used a barrier seal as the first coat and two coats of poly.

Was there a strong smell of thinners? If so, that's polyurethane.

Can you show us photos of the damage?

From the ladies original post she refered to the god awful smell that she encountered when she went into the house. This leans it towards being either a single or two pack polyurethane finish.

Wattyl have a three coat in a day polyurethane system
1 Quick dry. 20 to 30 minutes

2 Fast "A". Their 7008 product with the part 'A' of the mixture having a quick drying agent. One and a half to two hours ready to cut back and coat.

3 The normal 7008 two pack as the final coat.

Also, a Sydney mob called Urethane Coatings have the same sort of set up I.E. a fast seal, followed by an accelerated second coat, and a normal finish coat.
The Wattyl product is the more superior of the two.

[Extracare]

I didn't know those products existed - cheers. They sound like they wouldn't flatten out as well as slow acting two packs etc. Ever used them?

Given that the guys were in and gone within two hours on the last 2 days it seems that even these products would have been hard pressed to cure in time.

Photos would help as I don't think we really know how badly the floor dents and whether the dents are in the wood or only in the poly.

I reckon you can always put a mark on a pine floor with a thumbnail no matter how old the floor is. A picture would help us see how badly it dents.

[Larry McCully]

ahhhh sweet memories of using 7008. It has the most brilliant gloss level i have ever seen. I remember coating 100 sq mt floors in summer in north Queensland when i was a lad stater and coming out as whacked as and everything was white before my eyes. The isocyanate used to do something to the pupil in the eye and all you saw was white. Very cool i thought. I would still use it if it was specified, but now days i am more into single pacs. also i know of that company in Sydney called urethane coatings. I am one of marks customers.
Fast a 7008 does level out, you just have to be quick in getting it down.