My 4-inch ash plank floors, on our first floor, are tung oil finished. It took 4 coats and several days to be absorbed and dry properly but the house was vacant at the time. The longer you let it stand without walking on it after application the better. It needs to cure. They had fans going the whole time.

I was told the floors -- which are very light -- wouldn't hold up and would need to be redone every 2-3 years. Eight years later they still look very good but I effectively sealed them with a German product called Soffix Parquet. That went on full strength (by me, by hand) the first time and then is renewed for cleaning with a microfiber mop by diluting with water. It contains surfectant, oil and fragrance and things wipe up off the floor very easily, even in the kitchen. Floors are nowhere near needing to be redone but I'll know more over the next year when we're here full time. Till now we've been here six months a year -- so strictly speaking that would reduce the time to 4 years without redo.

When we need to redo floors I had planned to use Waterlox, which I did use on my powder room floor which is reclaimed 19th century wormy oak. It's also very good and withstood a flood.

Both the tung oil and Waterlox are expensive finishes but I'm super happy with them. I did poly upstairs and wish I hadn't.

My floors are installed over a plywood subfloor, which they added since there had just been carpet. I wouldn't glue down wood floors -- they expand and contract -- that sounds like trouble to me, especially if they were ever to become wet.

Here is a link that might be useful: Soffix parquet

You might want to read through the instructions linked below. They are from a vendor, but I found the part about absorption-within-40-minutes very useful in finishing my countertops, which I had turned into a goopy mess with full-strength tung oil the first time around.

In any case, I would test some of the uninstalled flooring with the full tung oil treatment before applying it to the floor. Best of luck.

Here is a link that might be useful: tung oil on hardwood floors

We have soft wood floors (12 - 20 inch pine planks) with an oil finish (Landark). I am very pleased. I have had a couple mishaps that gauged through the oil and a little dab and rub took care of it. Waterlox has polymerizing agents so it looks much like poly finish. Though repairable it will not be as easy I did above. The waterlox rep told me though eventually it would, it could take months for a touch up to blend.

Keep in my mind that there are significant differences among "tung oil" finishes. A few (and these are the most old-fashioned ones) are mostly, or all, pure tung oil. (These may be the trickiest to apply and needing the longest time to cure.) But most "tung oil" floor products just have some tung oil in them but are primarily synthetic varnishes (many with whatever passes in these low VOC-days for polyurethane). It would be helpful to start by getting the specifc tung oil product identified by product name, not just by an ingredient unless you are sure you talking about 100% pure tung oil.

Another thing to keep in mind is that it possible to lay (on top of an oil or varnish finish) a coat of paste wax (for instance Butcher's Bowling Alley Wax) which is spread by hand and then buffed with one of those big round machines floor machines. It can easily be touched up and rebuffed periodically. This will give the floors a nice shine, and make dust not stick. Some say it makes the floor slippery but I have lived with floors with Butcher's on them and never found that to be so. (Though you can deliberately slide around on them if you try.)

One caveat about waxes though: waxing floors is said to make it harder to get a good poly finish at some point in the future supposedly because the wax gets into the cracks and prevents attachment of the poly/plastic coating.

Floor finishes are quite complex and take serious investigation. There is much hearsay out there, and confusion about what products really are.

Gluing down the finish floor to concrete sounds shocking to me. It seems risky if it fails. Wood floors are never cheap and a short-cut wooden floor, unless wildly less expensive, seems like it might be a poor economy if it has a very short life. Also 1/2 inch thick wood probably can't be resanded more than once, possibly twice, more, if it gets worn, or stained, or you choose to change the finish.

HTH,

L

I've lived in an apartment where paste had been used on the floor and, at the time, owned a small buffer. It was a high-maintenance experience I'd never want to revisit. No way to touch up and Butcher's Wax is not very green. I feel it's old-school given the products available today but it's obviously an option.

I'd get some samples and make the finish decision based on which one made the wood look best. If the search function is working you also might be able to find an old thread that discusses products similar to Waterlox and a long discussion about tung oil vs tung oil products like Waterlox and others.

I know I've seen some prior discussions, but I couldn't find anything that helped. I may have to get more sample material so we can really test the finishes.

Testing finishes on samples of the flooring material sounds like a good idea. Our little antique chestnut-oak floor was done from leftover boards our contractor had used in a previous job. We swapped a bottle of wine for them since we only needed 25 square feet.

They went over the floor with tung oil but those older oak boards were far less absorbent than the newer ash flooring. The finish looked terrible after a year, which is when I applied the Waterlox.

I'd actually been through the house the boards came from when I first went to see our contractor's work and thought it was a new floor -- it had a poly finish. When the contractor saw the Waterlox, he sort of blurted out that the was sorry he hadn't seen that first -- our little floor looked so much more like old wood than theirs.

One of the posters to those old flooring threads was morgne, if I'm recalling. And there was a woman with a gray kitchen who was also doing floors in another room. I don't recall her name but someone else might. Or, she might even appear. It was a very long thread and there may have been two of them. At one point, one of the Waterlox guys appeared to clarify exactly what was in his product. Plus there was another product two posted had used that they really liked. Would provide you with a range of choices to test.

We just finished our new pine floors in Waterlox. We still have the original pine flooring in our 1860 home and wanted to finish our new floors so that they would resemble our older floors. As our new addition is a DIY project we were terrified to do our floors as we know how difficult it is to stain pine. We stained the floor using a combination of minwax gel stains after weeks of testing to get the right color. We put on two coats of Waterlox Original Sealer/Finisher in Medium Sheen, sanding in between coats. At this stage the floor will appear glossy. After a final sanding we put on one coat of Waterlox Satin Finish using a lambswool applicator. The result is far beyond what we were hoping for. The floors are soft and warm and look as though they've been there for years. We couldn't be happier. Haven't time to post a picture but will be happy to if it will help.

Thanks, Rococogurl. I will try some more searching this evening. I read something last night about an oil finish that needed 4-6 weeks to cure. If that means you can't walk on it or have furniture on it for 4-6 weeks, that isn't going to happen. Seems like I see a lot of Waterlox over tung oil and the tung oil I see most satisfaction with may be that dissolved with the citrus solvent.

I only have some 6 or 7 inch long pieces of a couple of different widths that were sent to me. One of those had a knot and cracked when DH dropped it. I don't have any of the finishes yet but rubbed some block oil on one of the broken pieces to get an idea what it would look like oiled and not so dry. It's similar to my knotty cherry hutch and island, but different. Really pretty, but I'm wondering if I will want just a little more finish to it -- and that makes me thing the Waterlox satin may be the way to go.

How long do you have to be off the floor with Waterlox?

Oldhouse1, since it sounds like you went the way I may be heading, I would love to see pictures.

And if anyone remembers the prior discussions, I would love some help finding them. Thanks again!

I'd consult the Waterlox website to get the official word on how long you'd need to be off the floor. It requires more than one application and it's very stinky. Not for super hot weather but with floors they keep fans going anyway to hasten the drying.

Even the pure tung oil didn't take anything like weeks. As I recall, they saturated the floors and left it overnight. Then removed the excess and reapplied. The new ash floors took 3 or 4 coats of the oil. Older, dryer hard wood might take more or less time. The whole thing had to be left for a few days after the final application. My recollection was a week total but we weren't living here and it might have been 10 days.

The tung-oil products with solvent in them (Waterlox et all) will cure more quickly then the pure oil which I used on my fireplace (big bore). Having been through this both ways, I'd focus on those. Patience is required for this but I feel it's worth it, as the PP said, the floors are beautiful.

Here are some of the previous GW threads:

tung oil finish on pine

pure tung oil finish

least toxic floor finish

walnut with tung oil finish

Here is a link that might be useful: 'Lox

lascatx-

We used Bush Oil on our floors, the curing time is 12 hours, and while we didn't drag furniture across them immediately, we did place furniture and walk on them the next day. It is a multi step process and requires some elbow grease, but the results are fantastic, the stuff really brings out the grain of the wood. It can be tinted and soaks into the wood, doesn't just sit on the surface. It's stinky, but so is tung oil.

The best part of an oiled finish is the ability to fix it, a little light sanding, a little oil, wipe it off and your floor looks good as new.

We bought ours at Lakeshore Hardwoods, a local (to me) company that I highly recommend, they are excellent in every respect and will ship.

Here's a pic of our porch floor and ceiling (lyptus) finished with Bush Oil, it's a rich, matte finish, not shiny at all (we're not big on shiny). They aren't the best pics for up close floor viewing, sorry.

Good luck-

sandyponder

Here is a link that might be useful: Lakeshore Hardwoods website

Rococogurl, thank you so much for seeking those out for me. I had found some but not all of them. Maybe I'm remembering some of the Waterlox discussions from countertops too -- there was a lot of that when we were making decisions and that's been a while. I'm not sure how we will handle the installation plus finishing and drying time. I wonder if we can have the floor installed and sanded and then apply the finish ourselves one room at a time.

Sandy, your floors look great. What kind of wood is that? Is it stained or natural color?

lascatx-

The wood is lyptus and it's not stained at all, the color and variations are natural. We have white oak in the rest of the downstairs and cherry stairs up to the second level and I wish the oak was all lyptus, it's beautiful, interesting and sort of modern looking.

We had a floor person install the flooring and we finished it one room at a time, took us all summer and fall to fully finish the Bush Oil application (we live in the land of ice and snow, and I would not use any oil based finish without being able to open the windows with impunity).

We're going to reapply a couple of coats in the kitchen and entry way this fall this fall, it's been 5 years and we are hard on stuff; two big, stinky doofus dogs, a kid, active family, etc., plus I might have dripped some (lots of) paint when I was using the kitchen as my furniture painting station. The stairs, den and LR still look great.

Good luck-

sandyponder

The wood looked like it was probably unstained, and it is gorgeous. I would prefer it over most oak, but white oak is much more appealing to me than the red oak that is more common here.

I talked to a couple of guys today -- one about the materials and one about the installation -- both about finishes. One likes the oil finishes but says a lot of folks think they are too much upkeep. Our discussion reminded me of my marble counters -- in a good way. The other guy said the oil finishes show dirt and most people are happier with a polyurethane finish -- also reminded me of the marble, but more of the nay sayers. He did suggest getting a large enough piece of something to treat with the oil and set on the floor where we can walk on it and the dogs track across it. I do have some smooth finish plywood in the garage that I could do that with.

I am still making inquiries on the availability and checking out the finishes. I'm looking for smaller quantities of the stuff to sample, but it's not easy to find so far. I did have 2 people say it would be feasible to lay the flooring, sand and then finish room by room at least with the oil finishes. That may help us get it all done. Moving out for a mooth or more is not an option with 2 dogs, a 19 year old cat and one in high school with lots of activities, but I'd like to get it done before the holidays begin. I didn't think that would be a problem, but it's looking a bit tight.