I have a wide plank fir floor to install in July. I’ve done lot’s of installing, but have never finished. The customers want it to be stained a dark, chocolate brown, and we have yet to decide on a finish. I’m trying to push OSMO oil, because it is very simple to use.
The reason I’ve never done it personally is because the clients have always don it themselves. If they go with something like a water based, I’m going to farm it out. This house is south facing with big windows, and is 100 ft from the lake.
EDIT: I also just remembered. It is over a crawlspace. I need to glue this floor down, because manufacturer won’t warranty otherwise. However, I am pretty sure I want to put some sort of mvapour barrier…
1. Should I spray the stain with an HVLP system (which I have), or just use a brush and rag?
2. Are water based finishes much more expensive than the oil?
3. What are some alternative finishing products I may not have heard of?
——————————-
People are entitled to their own opinions; People are not entitled to their own truth.
Jacob
Edited 5/2/2006 1:02 pm ET by MrJJ
Replies
I'm not floor guy but here are just a few thoughts...
If you put down a VB, won't that pretty much defeat the purpose of gluing down the floor? Is there a VB on the floor of the crawl space?
I've seen my floor guys apply finishes with kind of a wool head long handled mop type of tool. They use brushes around the edges.
There are some "paint on" vapor barriers--that you could then glue to. You could also seal the back (bottom) side of the flooring as well.