Old floors need TLC

[oldhome]

Hi All - looking for some advice on rescuing some 100 y/o 2" oak floors (and saving my wallet, as new floors from a pro are not an option).

Many places of the floor are splintering, exposing the tongue and providing splinters in our feet. The house is old, and I like that, plus I have a couple large dogs, so the fix doesn't need to look perfect but the floors still need do need to look good. I'm thinking to replace damaged boards and refinish with waterlox but had a few questions:

1. Given the current state of things, is there an option for staining a darker color? I'm afraid to sand further, so thinking safest option is a screen and recoat but am not sure if stain/waterlox could be applied over a screened floor.

2. 2" flooring isn't as easy to source as 2 1/4", how good or bad of an idea is it to get some 4" or 5" planks and rip them to 2"?

3. Based on the photos below, think I'm better off doing all new floors myself rather than replacing many individual sections?

Any other thoughts or words of encouragement?

 

[The Cobbler]

That floor has seen better days. it's used up unfortunately, any repair you attempt is a waste of time & $$$ in my opinion.

 

[930dreamer]

Yes there's epoxy two part fixes but if you have a bunch of damaged planks, replacement will probably be the best option.

 

[James-W]

I agree, rip out the old floor and put in a new floor. To buy the wood, rip it at two inches wide, tongue and groove it, then try to fill in the bad areas with new wood, then sand the whole floor and apply finish to it, would most likely end up costing more money than putting down a whole new floor. There are times when fixing what you have just isn't practical.

 

[73RR]

^^^what they said....

 

[PWC Repair]

Been there,done that. Mine is only 58 years old but I moved a few feet of wall and had to patch up some water damaged areas along with a 2'x5' section where a fireplace used to be. Fortunately my neighbor is a packrat and had some old 2" short boards in his shed. He also had a professional model drum floor sander he had bought at an auction. The worst part was carefully digging out the damaged sections. I found it best to sacrifice a skill saw blade and plunge cut/rip into the board to be removed. Then i could pry/break/chisel it out and remove nails without ruining adjacent boards. After that a bit of liquid nails, the new board, a couple nails set in with a punch, dab of filler, ready to re-finish. I went with 5 coats of poly mopped on with wool sanded and wiped in between every coat. All I can tell you is that refinishing an old hardwood floor is A LOT of work.

 

[pancho400cid]

Generally agree with the above but my brother had a similar situation and the guy doing his floors was able to rob good wood out of closets and hidden spots to fix the bad spots... you can put something else in the hidden spots. It worked great for him, but is a question of ratios obviously.