Q: We recently had our oak floors resanded and restained. A few days later, I noticed some deep gouge lines that have very rough edges. They look like two parentheses on top of each other where each parenthesis is made up of 2-3 side by side lines, surrounded by a couple of spots that have 3 neatly lined up puncture holes.
Any suggestion as to whether it could be caused by the folks doing the refinish or what else could be the problem?
A: How many of these lines are there? If it is just two or three, it might be caused by the sander digging into the floor because the floor is not flat in that area, and there is basically a hill. If these marks are everywhere, something is wrong with his machine. As to the puncture marks, I can hardly guess. Something hard and sharp stuck to the big sander wheel?
Follow-up: Thank you for your response. Here is a picture to show you.
Also, there are a couple of some strange punctures around these scratches, less than a foot away.
A: Well, a couple of those nasty gashes looks like something heavy was dragged on the floor. The 3 little pin holes could be from a beetle and have been there from the factory. The other small indentation or gash looks like something was dropped, such as a chisel.
Follow-up: Can you tell if this would be something that happened before or after the staining/finish?
A: In the picture with fingers pointing to the pin holes and a short cut (perhaps a dropped chisel), that looks like it happened after. The big dig marks, I would guess happened before. It appears there is stain and finish in them and it also appears at the end of one of them there was an attempt at wood filler. That is, if I’m seeing this correctly. This is your place. You would know if those marks were there before or not.