Two Big Repairs & One Big Change

Here are the two jobs that we have been on; both needed repairs and only one was done by Cardinal Hardwood.

The subfloor was a mess on the job we did, a wall was removed to make the kitchen area larger. The subfloor was a roller coaster, to be honest. It went from 1/2 inch at the far left to 3/8 in the middle and nothing at the far right. We took plywood and screwed it down, then took the big machine with a long straightedge and made it flat to the straightedge:

Once we got that done, we started the lace-in to the old flooring:

I would not believe it unless I saw it, but the old floor is so loose that it made you think it had water damage at one time ...  turns out it was installed with a pin-nail gun. This added to the pain, because we had to match the work from the '70s and the poor workmanship they did. The old flooring has gaps you can fall in, so we had to keep it the same to make the homeowner happy. A string and a story board kept the lines running the same, and the story board allowed us the look of the install from the '70s. I never had to leave gaps in a floor before, but it does look the same and they like it.

We are now waiting for the paint guy to come in and get his base coats on and do any repairs he has to do. They gave us their word they won't mess the floor up… OK, like I believe them. But, the timeline for them and us just did not work out. I do not like for the wall work or paint to be done after me, but it just worked that way on this job. I go back and sand it in a few weeks, lets keep our fingers crossed.

The next job is 1,500 feet of elm. It's an old elm floor that was installed in the early '80s and never sanded. In fact, it was left with no HVAC or any way to keep the critters out of the old carriage house-it has been left alone for years. Now the builder did not want me to do the repairs (he said I cost too much), so he did them. But can you see the oak next to the elm?

The homeowners are making a guest home/family area out of it, and the homeowner came to the job at dinner time and asked what was the deal with the old wood and the new wood. When I saw it, I told him, "That is elm, not oak." He said, "Can you make it look the same?" Well, this guy owns a few banks in town, so I said, "Can you make $10 look like $100?" He understood at that point. The builder needs to hear the old joke: Do you know your ash from your oak?

They may be getting some elm to fix the repairs. He was not real upset but wanted to know how they made the mistake. I got it all rough-cut today, the sander was on high! I made my 40-grit and 60-grit today and will start on the final cut in the morning. This job will not be a multi-disc sander job; the floor rolls with every beam and the multi-disc will jump like a Mexican jumping bean on the floor. It is soft-plate time on this one; I'll use the dust control buffer and thick red pad with 100-grit, then go to the shake-and-bake to 120 grit. The look he wants is "old rustic but not ate up." Please tell me what that means, sir? I think he wants a flat floor but not a perfect floor. The best look for this job is Monocoat. His wife wants a "soft finish" … Again, please tell me what that means? A soft finish mean satan right?

Now on to some other news: I will be shutting down Cardinal Hardwood, so this will be my last post as a flooring contractor. Once these two jobs are done, I will be taking a new task on. I want to thank all of you for taking the time to read my blog. It has been a fun ride for the past two years. It's hard to think that two years have gone by, but they have. I am pleased to see that we have some skilled folks taking over the blogs.

I will be at the NWFA convention in Dallas so hope to see you all there…