Scratched Hardwood Repair Looks Dull

Dear Rob:

I touched up a scratch on my red oak hardwood floor using the same finish that the floor contractor used and it looks duller then the rest…… it was a oil based finish called Fabulon.

-Kim From Alabama

Dear Kim:

I am sorry to hear about your scratched hardwood floor problem. Dull finish or mismatched finish is very common when blending scratch repairs on hardwood floors, and there could be several reasons for this:

1. You may not have stirred the polyurethane well enough before applying it.  If you only dipped your brush into the top of the finish, without stirring well, that may have led to your finish not being shiny.
2. You may have used the right material, but the wrong sheen.  If you didn’t use a can of polyurethane that was left over from your project, call whoever applied the finish to double check what sheen they used.
3. If you sanded the area around the scratch, you may not have applied enough polyurethane in the sanded area, resulting in a dull area because the finish is thinner in that area.

It’s tough to know for sure which of these possibilities applies to your situation, but hopefully they will get you started with solving your problem.

I recommend that you carefully outline with tape the adjacent boards along their edges and then gently scrape the area that you originally touched up with a hand held floor scraper that you can get from any big box home retailer.  That will take the finish back down to nearly bare wood, but do not go all they way down.

I would properly stir, not shake, the polyurethane.  Then carefully apply a thin coat of finish.  Let that coat dry and repeat. If all went well, your floor should be as good as new.

-Rob

Fixing Dull and Shiny Spots in Hardwood Floor Finish

Dear Rob:

I recently had my floors refinished and the poly came out very uneven. Some places it’s really shiny and others, its very dull. Any ideas on a quick fix to even it out? I have to move furniture into these rooms this weekend.

-Lacey G. from Merrimack, New Hampshire.

Dear Lacey:

I assume that you have a polyurethane floor, so I will base my answer on that. The dull and shiny spots in your hardwood floor indicate that your installers did not apply the finish correctly.

Dull spots in polyurethane floors usually indicate that the finish was not applied carefully, the applicator had a dry spot on it, or the finish was thinned out with a solvent such as mineral spirits. The latter is a big mistake, but a common shortcut in the industry among people trying to save money on materials.

Shiny spots in polyurethane floors can be caused by the finish not flowing out properly and pooling in areas, or inconsistent screening between coats of finish.

There is no quick fix for this, what I recommend is that you have the refinishers come back and screen and coat the floor. A screen and coat is a procedure where the floor is lightly sanded (or screened) with a floor maintainer or buffer, instead of a floor sander. This light sanding evens out the finished, cleans away debris, and roughens the surface, so another coat of finish will be able to properly adhere to the existing finish.

There is no other way to even out the finish.

-Rob