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Robert Birdsell (Tongue and Groove)
Приєднався 30 вер 2011
Channel for Tongue and Groove, hardwood flooring contractor in Seattle, WA www.tongueandgroove.us
tongueandgroovehardwoods/
Videos of my work and how-to's for hardwood flooring.
tongueandgroovehardwoods/
Videos of my work and how-to's for hardwood flooring.
Saving a Water Damaged Floor - Refinishing Instead of Replacing
This home in Edmonds, Washington had a plumbing leak and a small flood. They were told by another company they would need to tear out their whole floor and replace it. I was able to save them a lot of time and money by drying it out and refinishing it instead.
If you're in the North Seattle area and interested in a hardwood flooring project, click here to schedule an estimate: tongueandgroove.us/contact/
If you're in the North Seattle area and interested in a hardwood flooring project, click here to schedule an estimate: tongueandgroove.us/contact/
Переглядів: 1 410
Відео
Installing Oak Flooring in a Bedroom - Subfloor Preparation is Important!
Переглядів 6867 місяців тому
When installing a new hardwood floor, making sure the subfloor is flat is key. During construction the subfloor will often get rained on, especially here in Seattle, and the edges will swell up. Even after it dries, it's like getting a piece of paper wet, it never quite goes back to being flat. This bedroom was originally built with carpet, so the pad would have hidden these issues. Now I've go...
Refinishing an Oak Bedroom (Time Lapse)
Переглядів 1896 років тому
The homeowner removed the carpet in this bedroom due to severe allergies. The oak flooring underneath (mixed red and white) was pretty beat up, and the finish was discolored in many spots. The floor had also been gouged by the carpet stretcher, luckily the gouges were going with the grain and were able to be filled with putty instead of replacing the boards. The finish going on at the end is Bo...
Restoring a 115 year old fir floor
Переглядів 15 тис.6 років тому
This century old fir floor is in an apartment in Seattle's Capitol Hill, and refinishing it felt like a geological study. The various strata included layers of varnish, wax, multiple colors of paint, then carpet covering the whole lot. After the carpet was removed I was called in to save the patient. I started by grinding off the layers of various crap with 16 grit belts on the big machine, the...
Sanding a crusty floor - Hummel POV
Переглядів 3096 років тому
Sanding layers of paint, wax, and fused on carpet pad off of a 115 year old fir floor in Seattle's Capitol Hill.
Installing white oak flooring in bedroom (time lapse)
Переглядів 2426 років тому
Installing 2-1/4" tongue and groove #1 white oak flooring. Coated with Bona Traffic over Duraseal golden oak stain.
Installing a hardwood floor with large oval inlay
Переглядів 1,7 тис.7 років тому
After slowly gathering leftover material over the course of more than a year, we finally accumulated enough to install the entire bedroom. The material includes maple, American cherry, red and white oak, in a variety of grades, and widths ranging from 2-1/4" to 6". The real showpiece is a large oval medallion about 2' x 4' with inlays of maple, walnut, and mahogany. The medallion was made over ...
Repairing dents in a hardwood floor with an iron
Переглядів 160 тис.7 років тому
Here I'm doing a small repair on two dents in a white oak floor. First I use an iron to "pop" the dents out, then sand and refinish the damaged boards. I use a light stain with clear waterborne finish to fake the look of Swedish without stinking up the customer's home Wood - No. 1 White Oak 2-1/4" T&G Stain - Bona Dri-fast Golden Oak Finish - Bona Traffic clear Music - United States Marine Band...
Time Lapse: preparation and installation of click bamboo flooring (mostly preparation)
Переглядів 2717 років тому
Material: Morning Star XD 1/2" x 5" Click Strand Carbonized Bamboo Underlayment: Eco Silent Sound HD Underlayment Unfortunately the GoPro could only record for about 6 hours before the 64gb card was full. Transferring and converting the files took several hours before we could clear the card and start filming again. We ultimately decided finishing the project was more important than filming it,...
Small bedroom install time lapse
Переглядів 588 років тому
Hope everybody likes watching time lapse videos. #1 grade 2 1/4 red oak being installed in a small bedroom. I plugged in the gopro this time so the SD card quit on me instead. Someday I'll get all the pieces together.
Rack and Nail ~80sqft
Переглядів 428 років тому
Toward the end of a fairly tricky and slow paced install, this was the first area I was able to work out in the open. The material is solid unfinished #1 white oak strip flooring. I had to stop and set cleats several times because I was outpacing the airflow through the 1/4" hoses I'm using. Need to upgrade to 3/8" hoses and fittings to really get the maximum speed out of this gun Friendly Day ...
Time Lapse of Hardwood Flooring Install
Переглядів 4138 років тому
Installing unfinished red oak strip flooring in a dining room. The kitchen had existing hardwood floors, so I cut back and laced into those across the doorway. The original time length was about 2 hours.
Great job! The amount of attention to detail is wonderful! I hope we have more workers like you. Keep it up and wishing more success.
Figure out why it cupped in the first place?
The areas away from the flooding were all slightly cupped both before and after dehumidifying, so I'm guessing the wood was exposed to humidity (mudding or painting) after installation. It likely crowned slightly and the original company didn't let it acclimate before sanding it flat. Then when it eventually acclimated it would have cupped like that. It looks more pronounced in the video than it was.
The audio in this video is great. Like listening to an NPR segment. Why doesn’t this channel have more subscribers? Algorithm, do your thing!
This is was very informative, thanks!
Music was entertaining.
That looks like a lot of work. Can i just use a wood filler instead?
Did you find out?
The background music is super annoying
Please fix my floor! This all looks too hard 😩
WTF is with the music, ffs.
Great video Robert. My main concern is how the new finish will look next to the old finish. Any tricks you can recommend? As I would rather not have to redo my entire floor.
Not really. That's starting to get into art restoration techniques. The low cost of refinishing already makes this type of work not economically viable, so there's basically no effort in the industry to cater to it. Best you could try is scuffing up the new finish with some steel wool or something to try to dull it to match the surrounding, but I've never managed to get that to work well.
It will Matte down and blend in over time
Do not use steel wool "or something" to "scuff up" your floor finish. I'm confused why the poster thinks the problem is that the rest of your finish is scuffed. I assume you want the stain and the shininess to match. That's the problem with taking this approach. You will have to have a lot of experience to properly match it, if you don't still have more of it on hand. It's quite a lot of effort for a result that arguably will be no better, and perhaps far more noticeable than a proper wood filler spot treatment. I'm suspicious that several steps of this restoration didn't go as planned so it snowballed into sanding, scraping, restaining and refinishing entire boards. You can find many, many videos that take a simpler approach with phenomenal results.
Wow, thats a hell lot of effort to fix small dents 😀
That looks like trash!!! Two passes finish???!!!
16, 36, 50, 100 and 3 coats. But thanks, kid.
Exactly!!! No effort was made to get out the majority of dark areas. It’s crazy to attempt 100%, but this guy left 80% of the dark areas. For the record, I just refinish 2,000 sf of Fir from 1795. The project took 4 times longer than a regular refinish job because I was hell bent on making the final product look it’s best. Did I have to sand more than I normally would? Yes! Did I have to special order 16 grit drum paper because the Fir was surprisingly hard and almost impenetrable? Yes! Did I have to remove an extra 10-15% of surface area in order to achieve 90-95% CLEAR surface area? Also YES! At the end of the day, these floors have never had a full refinish over their 250 year life. Also bear in mind, most old floors are a full 1” thick (sometimes more than 1”) which already makes them 1/4” thicker than brand new solid wood flooring sold in stores. Simply put - these floors can “afford” to take an extra/aggressive refinishing. I agree you shouldn’t perform an aggressive refinishing very often. If done correctly (emphasis on correctly), a full refinish will technically last indefinitely, and you will only need to do a superficial screening every 10 to 15 years, which doesn’t remove much if any wood material. People half ass refinish jobs, which is why homeowners find themselves doing multiple aggressive refinishes over a relatively short period of time. If anyone is interested in my most recent project, I’d be happy to share before and after photos. The floors went from being dark brown, badly damaged, weathered, and dirty, to looking like they were freshly milled (with plenty of character intact!) Simply put: too many professionals get lazy when refinishing Fir, and they make silly comments like “it’s just part of the character”. 🤦🏻♂️
@@robertbirdsell5838 people aren’t being malicious. People who know better will call out this refinish project as half-assed. It’s not personal. Just the truth. Never use water based finish, let alone Bona. Water based finish will look like hell in a few years, and it won’t hold up. It’s the reason so many floors need frequent refinishing. Also, most Bona products are crap. I use Poloplaz premiero oil urethane on 90% of projects. I also know the difference between “character” and areas that aren’t complete. Too many homeowners are uninformed, so it’s easy to tell them “this is the best we can do…it’s the nature of the wood”. I hear contractors say the SAME thing about Maple, Oak, and Pine 😂 Translation: I didn’t want to go the extra mile to make this floor look it’s best. Sure, you never want to compromise the floor by over sanding for one or two imperfections. But let’s be honest, most older floors are AT LEAST 1” thick, which means you have a lot of wiggle room. The Fir floors in my recent project ranged from 1.25” thick (in the 1800 addition) to 3.5” thick in the original part of the house built in 1765. You bet I went to town on the 3.5” thick boards - had nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Anything less would’ve been a sin, and to be honest, it would’ve been a dishonor to the original craftsmen and a figurative stain on the beauty of the floor itself. Take my comment however you want. I just want to see homeowners and professionals alike DO BETTER
@@shawnburke7974 You must be fun at wood floor finishers parties.
with all those layers of paint and finish was any lead testing done prior to sanding the floor?
Test kit was negative.
Does the iron thing work with deeper dents?
Fir is nice wood. Holds up to water very well. I just refinished a fir floor that had been flooded out. No cupping at all.
What did you charge for that job?
No way would this be worth doing for two scratch. Call it antiquing the floor and behave a beer.
Wow! Great instructions. Quick question- what type of vapor barrier was that? Thank you!!
Aquabar B
Didn't work for me
You should take out those darker spots with 36, or 40 grit
I don't think you understand the nature of fir flooring of this age. The discoloration is deep enough in the wood that further sanding would compromise the structure of the boards. At this point it is more of a patina than a defect.
I’ve done a couple of these fir floors and it is hilarious when people say you should’ve done this you should’ve done that! Vg fir Had its place back in the early 1900s ain abundance as a Cheap option as old growth was everywhere in our forests especially in the PNW! Wood is a living thing and I Challenge anybody to try to live 100 years without liver spots! Case closed
Exactly. No effort was made to get out the majority of dark areas. It’s crazy to attempt 100%, but this guy left 80% of the dark areas. For the record, I just refinish 2,000 sf of Fir from 1795. The project took 4 times longer than a regular refinish job because I was hell bent on making the final product look it’s best. Did I have to sand more than I normally would? Yes! Did I have to special order 16 grit drum paper because the Fir was surprisingly hard and almost impenetrable? Yes! Did I have to remove an extra 10-15% of surface area in order to achieve 90-95% CLEAR surface area? Also YES! At the end of the day, these floors have never had a full refinish over their 250 year life. Also bear in mind, most old floors are a full 1” thick (sometimes more than 1”) which already makes them 1/4” thicker than brand new solid wood flooring sold in stores. Simply put - these floors can “afford” to take an extra/aggressive refinishing. I agree you shouldn’t perform an aggressive refinishing very often. If done correctly (emphasis on correctly), a full refinish will technically last indefinitely, and you will only need to do a superficial screening every 10 to 15 years, which doesn’t remove much if any wood material. People half ass refinish jobs, which is why homeowners find themselves doing multiple aggressive refinishes over a relatively short period of time. If anyone is interested in my most recent project, I’d be happy to share before and after photos. The floors went from being dark brown, badly damaged, weathered, and dirty, to looking like they were freshly milled (with plenty of character intact!) Simply put: too many professionals get lazy when refinishing Fir, and they make silly comments like “it’s just part of the character”. 🤦🏻♂️
You should change your username.
@@shawnburke7974you seem upset but good for you I guess
Amazing. What is the name of the tool that you used to scrape off the finish?
It's just called a scraper. Sometimes they're sold as paint scrapers.
Robert Birdsell Thank you!!
Cross cutting with a 16 grit belt? Did your mother drop you on your head??? You'll never get the cross cut marks out.
Got them out just fine with 36.
The angle that he cut it at wasn’t too aggressive. No problem removing those lines. Anything finer than 24 on that floor would be a waste of time
Thanks, we moved a fridge out of a kitchen, foot came off and grooved customers oak floor.
Super cool! Amazing knowledge of wood and great skills. My respect 👍
A second Q: can you spot repair for something where you have the same stain and varnish? I'm concerned about blending the edges of the varnish. Can you buff varnish out like on a car to blend it? Maybe sand with high grit like 1000, 1500, 2000, 3000 then buff? Ever tried it, would it work?
In my experience buffing finish from repairs doesn't work too well to blend it in. Usually the surrounding finish is more worn and dull, so buffing just makes the repair stand out more.
Robert, can we use something else instead of the vapor barrier? Would anything that blocks the heat and vapor be good there? I would expect it so. Not sure I can find the vapor barrier paper without buying an entire roll.
I don't know how much work the vapor barrier did, I was just worried about over steaming the rest of the floor, don't really know what else would work, or if it was necessary.
Thanks Robert. People commenting here about how labor intensive or how much you scraped off are clearly idiots that don't fix anything and have no idea what it takes to do Home Improvement. Your clip is spot on - I was gonna look for Bona too after a contractor buddy recommended it. Are you in Canada, just curious.
Inspiring. TY for sharing! Why is there a lighter color 2' perimeter around the room? The cause wasn't obvious in the layers of history removed in the vid. Not a good look. I take it the stain was too deep to remove.
I'm not sure, but I think it has to do with furniture around the perimeter of the room. The century of foot traffic would have all been in the space in the center, the areas under furniture wouldn't get much wear.
@@robertbirdsell5838 That makes sense. I was wondering whether fir is photosensitive. Back in the day carpets could be much larger than area-rugs but not wall to wall. I don't know how deep UV lightening goes. Or maybe certain carpet or underlay dyes could stain.
@@WeTubule Our Seattle 1918 fir floor had this perimeter effect from the perimeter being finished but the area under the large rug you describe being unfinished. Before starting, the finished area was darker and unfinished area lighter but it reversed after sanding off the finish since the finish had protected the wood over time. I ended up with a more consistent color/appearance by continuing to sand off more to get deeper in the center areas to lighten it up.
... and was sorry I used filler in the joints since it has gradually fallen out in chunks, especially the larger joints. I did it maybe 25 years ago, so maybe the products are better now, but I suspect the combination of larger joints from decades of drying and the expansion/contraction of the wood in our moist winter and dry summer climate would do it regardless.
how about just using wood filler?
@@c.a.g.3130 LOL another brilliant know-it-all comment. Wood filler would stand out for dents of the size shown in this video unless you use advanced methods. If you're filling a dent that isn't in an area with a lot of "grain" or color variation, it will work perfectly. There are dozens of kinds of wood filler and there methods to make it look grainy. This CAG fella who thinks he is pro is very definitely not
Another idiot that put hardwood in a kitchen. 🤦🏻♂️
It's nice to see what can be done with fir. I just bought an old house build in 1882 that has a 7' x 10' room with 6" Fir boards. I probably could do the refinish with just an edge sander. I would skip the wood filler part of the process. Wood needs to breathe and expand when needed and any filler will get in the way.
Robert, as far as the sequence, did you apply the Duraseal after the 50 grit and before the 100, or what sequence? Also, prior to applying the finish and following the vacuum, do you do mop a tack cloth or other dust adherent just to catch anything the vac may have missed? Lastly, if Duraseal unavailable, could you recommend another product? What finish of Duraseal did you use on that fir? Pine? I don't see a "fir" listed. Oh...How long does the Duraseal cure before the next sanding. What was the time lapse of the entire refinishing sequence (how long did it take?) Thanks in advance for your reply!
I troweled the filler on after the 50 pass. It can be sanded about an hour afterward in ideal conditions, but I prefer to leave it overnight when I can, especially on a floor like this with larger gaps. It also requires some additional spot filling because it sinks into the larger gaps. The filler is really kind of optional on a floor like this though. The boards flex a lot and will work it out of the gaps over time, but the client wanted it in there. I will dry tack some floors, but if the wood is old and splintery, it tends to catch the mop and do more harm than good. I have a very good vacuum, and abrade and wet tack before the final coat, so they come out nice and smooth at the end. Woodwise and Bona also make trowelable filler, but they are thinner and I usually have to fill twice with them in addition to spot filling. You can also use wood doe (which mixes with fine dust from the wood itself to match color) but it is basically thin airplane glue and very noxious. I believe I used the red oak colored filler. The fir will turn darker over time and the filler won't, but it matches well enough at the beginning, which the client wanted since it's a rental. Total time for what was shown is probably about 6 hours, but split across a couple days.
We always say in video production, showing is much more effective than telling and this video exemplifies that maxim to a "T". Excellent sound track. One of the best UTubes I've seen, not to mention I'm here for the benefit of my 92 yr old "straight grain" unfinished fir floors. Had a floor re-finisher I'd used on another job provide me with a very fair estimate; however, he didn't include the Duraseal (or similar) crack filler which the numerous "less then tight" jointing of this tongue/groove flooring dictates. The other area I'd had reservations over was his use of polyurethane as the finish. Fir floors are soft in tone and, imo, do not look correct with the darker tints or glossy finish of poly. Waterlox seems to do a very good job, plus can be reapplied w/o refinishing. Will also check out your Bona product. Thank you for posting this video.
Loving the music!
The ratio of equipment, time, effort, etc. to actual problem here is absurd. I guess this makes sense if you already have all this stuff, but still...good lord.
:)
My exact thinking. lol
C. A. G. Is this literally the only way to fix a chip? I had a chip in my hardwood floor. Filled it with wood filler, stained it, then used brown and black crayons to get it really similar to the floor, and added polyurethane. It’s not perfect like in this video, but you would never notice it unless I pointed to it or if you were looking really closely.
C. A. G. I’m good, thanks. Not sure why you’re being an asshole.
@@c.a.g.3130 WTAF are you talking about. Wood filler isn't peanut butter. It's made for this. There literally dozens of choices of wood filler for this job, and you can easily find a color matched product. You can find plenty of videos on how to do hard wood spot repair like wjaiv is asking about, and they are actually videos by professionals unlike this one. No offense to the poster of this video, but they clearly are not - but they did an impressive job and used an interesting method. They just thought this was the best approach for their specific dents.
Love the video! Did you only use 2 grits on this? (16 & 24?) then what’s the paste application that you screen on and then sand off? I’m refinishing an old house in Everett and pretty damn close on the sanding part (16,24,36,60,80 sequence) I’m pretty tired of sanding as you can imagine 1700 sq ft +. What would you use to “glue” the splintery fir together for a finish? Any specific Poly or ??
I went 16/50/100 on the machine and 12/50/100 on the edger, then a 100 grit screen on the buffer at the end. The paste is Duraseal's trowel wood filler, it helps fill in some of the splintered out grain in the wood and the gaps between boards. I put 3 coats of Bona waterbase finish on it at the end. I don't know how much the finish is gluing it together, I think the filler is doing more of that work, then the water base layers are sitting on top to sort of hold it in. You could try picking stuff up from local distributors with cash, but they tend to not want to sell to non-contractors. You can also buy the stuff online (I think Bona finishes are even on Amazon), but it's a bit more expensive there.
Robert Birdsell that’s great info! Do you think it’s too late to add the duraseal? If I’ve gone to 80 grit with the drum sander? Would you add this stuff and go over it with another 80 or 100 on a square buff? I rented the edger and drum, but own a square buff. Any distributors in the north end you’d recommend? Thanks so much!
@@billymcfun If you trowel filler on, you'll want to hit it with the drum sander again. The filler will clog up the square buff sandpaper pretty fast. You could run a fast 100 pass with the drum, then square buff with 100 after that.
@@robertbirdsell5838 do you not get track marks with the hummel? Didn't see you nail down any nails.. usually on fir the metal mars up the sand paper and leaves track lines on the fir even on the final paper.
This is so fun to see!! I stumbled upon this video doing some research on re-finishing old flooring, we are restoring a house in North Everett and are knee deep in this process.
Next time just be more careful installing the dish washer! Lol
I saw another video do this without stripping the finish off. Will that work?
Depends on the finish. This was Swedish, so it's like a thin layer of plastic, the water can't really permeate it.
Yes. You can find videos of how to do this with wood filler. You can get wood filler that takes stain just like wood. It really depends on what kind of wood floor you have, and what kind of dents you have. My wood floor has the occasional knot or irregularity. Smaller dents that have a "natural" looking shape compared to the wood grain are *easy* to fix with wood filler or to spot fix in general. But if you have larger, jagged/irregular shaped dents, it's a much bigger challenge
@@robertbirdsell5838 What if it's oil?
Great now my mom won't find out, knifes kill. Wood that is
Bunch of lazy fucks on here who would rather just replace the whole thing than do more than 3 steps 😂 Absolutely wonderful work! Very thorough-something people of all ages lack these days!
You make it look so easy. I'd fk up my floor! 😂
On a prized guitar wood sure.... But on a wood floor, where little Johnny is just going to pound in a fresh dent, later on that night?.... Fricken great job, and great video. Thanks
Hey, I resent both the implication that I'll pound in a fresh dent and the "little" part.
That's absolutely superb, thanks for sharing.
Fuckin try-hard.
Wtf? Scrape up so much of wood? Are yOu kidding me? No thanks!
If you don't you won't be able to get a uniform look on the wood tile. Understand the concept before bashing.
Excellent job
Now that's a thorough job!
Thanks for the video, very nice job, just watched it with a friend who had a large divot in their floor, it gave them hope!
Are you crazy?!?! Easier to replace whole floor! Thanks for the "tip".
This cost almost nothing, and took about 2 hours, most of which was waiting for finish to dry. I'm not sure how you think it would be easier to replace anything.
smartest response of all. once realized. panic sets in to all!
lvck1 lvck1 how’d you work that one out?! I’ve just layed 20m2 of oak engineered flooring. I can tell you this method is 100x quicker and 100x cheaper then replacing the whole floor!
how much did it cost to fix the two dents.
@@Jack-gz6mi This method generally will not work on engineered flooring. The top laminate surface is too thin.
Fantastic work, Robert! Will you do another video like this soon?