Fixing floor boards

[binaryzer0]

Hi folks ,

A newbie in DIY here - we have these floor boards (seems to be composite tongue and grove to me - but no expert in this at all) which have some furniture marks. I’m not sure how best to fix these - should I be sanding/waxing these or any special product should be used. 

any insight would be greatly appreciated. 

 

[StevieB]

Wonderful to have you back posting on Bunnings Workshop @binaryzer0. Thanks for reaching out with your question.

@MitchellMc will be more than happy to help when he's back on the site on Friday. Thanks for your patience in the meantime. Let me tag @redracer01 and @TedBear to see if they have any suggestions to share.

We'd love to follow along with any projects you're working on at the moment, so feel free to post any time you need a hand.

Stevie

[redracer01]

Hello @binaryzer0 

A warm welcome to Bunnings Workshop. This type of damage often occurs when furniture legs have no felt pads underneath them. To repair them we need to take a few steps. Before we begin we need to identify the stain and varnish used on the floor. If you still have the original tin used on your floor this would make it a lot simpler and we can just use the same brand and stain. However if not we now have to do a bit of investigation and color matching. Take at least half a dozen photos of your floor and bring it to Bunnings at the paint shop. Ask the paint specialist for assistance in trying to identify the stain and varnish used on your floor. There is an interior stain and varnish display board with varying degrees of varnish placed on sample boards. Using what you remember and the photos try to find one that is a best match. We will not get a perfect repair due to the age of the varnish and floor. There is also the fact that we may be using a stain and varnish with a different formula so we need to try and match that and hope we get close. I usually tell paint customers that if they have part of their flooring unfinished this would be the perfect spot to try a test coat and see if we are close. Once you are confident that we have a close match we can then proceed to prepare the spot for re-coating. Using superfine steel wool gently rub the damaged area to remove loose varnish and debris our goal is to prep and not to go deeper in to the finish. Once we've removed all loose material and the area is clean you may attempt your first coat. I suggest a thin coat so that the repair spot is not so obvious. Use a high quality Monarch 38mm Woodcare Paint Brush this is the ideal brush for repair as it has a filament end on the brush that will leave a superior finish with minimal brush marks. Ideally you want to wait until the first coat is dry and we can observe if a second coat is necessary for color matching. In the case of the other area where the damage is more severe a  second coat will be necessary. There are several methods of repair and restore on various websites but our aim is for the minimal invasive type. Others will suggest a full on sand down and re-seal which is labor intensive and has no guarantee that it will match the existing finish. Once the repair has been accomplished I suggest getting some felt pads to cover the furniture legs to prevent similar damage from occurring again. I hope my suggestions help in your repairs. Thank you for sharing your query with the community and if you have any more questions or anything else we can help you with please don't hesitate to post it here on workshop.

Cheers,

Red

[MitchellMc]

Hi @binaryzer0,

It's fantastic to see that you've received a comprehensive reply from the knowledgeable @redracer01. 

If these marks haven't gone completely through the coating to bare timber, you might like to try some Feast Watson 1L Floor Polish on an inconspicuous section. This product works particularly well on rejuvenating the shine on dulled coatings and might work in your situation. I would caution, though, that this product would need to be stripped off before following @redracer01's method above, so try it on a small section first to see if you are satisfied with the results.

Please let us know if you have questions.

Mitchell

[binaryzer0]

Hi Folks,

thank you for your very detailed replies. I'll be following the above instructions and will post the updates. For now I've added pads under the furniture to save us from further damage.