New white oak doesn't match old white oak from year 2000

3 years ago

New house had tile throughout kitchen and mudroom. We removed all tile and installed new white oak 3-4inch flooring. The rest of the house 1-2 inch white oak planks (we confirmed with multiple flooring specialists but did not send to lab). The existing white oak was from the year 2000, which was the year the house was originally built.

We love the natural look of white oak so all floors throughout the house were sanded at the same time (new and existing), water based finish applied, and then three coats of clear poly. The end result...not good. Stark difference between exiting floors and new floors even though same process was applied to both (at least that's what the stainer said). Pictures below.

When I called stainer he tried to explain that the reason could be that the older white oak was already darkened (I guess, but the house is from 2000, not 1950), and that there are other factors such as location of the white oak that was sourced. Neither rang true to me.

Any suggestions as to how I should move forward?

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Comments (6)

cupofkindnessgw
3 years ago
Even beautifully finished and sealed wood ambers over time. That mellowing process starts right away, there is no magical age that wood starts to darken or change color, exposure to air and light causes this (among other things that can vary from tree to tree harvested from the same forest). I'm sure you know this. I hope a flooring pro will chime in with solutions. I'm sorry that the outcome is not what you expected, you spent a lot of money to upgrade your floor. It will work out.
J Sk
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago
It all could be true regarding the wood but my question would be: when they applied stain or sealer, didn't they notice the problem? Why did they progress with work ? Did they think you would be OK with floor like that?
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palimpsest
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago
2000 is 23 years ago which is plenty of time for wood to change color.

My floor guy tries to install old salvaged flooring adjacent to existing flooring, even when staining.
chispa
3 years ago
For me, the bigger issue is that you went with a different width ...

Also no need to send to lab. There is an easy testing kit, you just take some wood shavings off the floor and put a few drops on it. Red and white oak react differently to the drops. Did any of the floor specialists do that easy test? That was the first thing our wood floor guy did when we added wood floors to match the existing ones in a 10 year old house. They were red oak and the match was perfect when refinished.
blfenton
3 years ago
Did you choose the same grade as the original floor?
PRO
JAN MOYER
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago

Twenty three years is a lot of amber time no matter white oak or red oak. Did you see the entire area in it's just sanded state, prior to clear coat? Just a guess, but perhaps not?