Tinting the polyurethane. Nothing really new or groundbreaking here, as this practice has been going on for a long, long time. However, what is noteworthy is the amount of care we take in doing the tinting.
A few things can go wrong with this polyurethane tinting. One of the things I often see in houses where tinting has been attempted is that the incorrect stain has been used, which buggers up the look completely. Rather than enjoying an even hue of colour right across the floor, it in fact ends up blotchy and patchy. Not the ideal look in my book. The other common mistake is trying to go too dark with the tinting, either by putting way too much tint in with the polyurethane, or trying to apply it too thickly on the floor. Either way ends in tears.
If your considering having your floor tinted, maybe, to help darken some new Pine, or to give your Baltic Pine a bit of an older look, well, don't expect too much in regard to the depth of colour, or how dark it can become. What you can expect is a nice subtle glow across the boards that clear coating alone probably won't achieve. Particularly on the lighter timber species.
The biggest issue for me is over-lapping. It shits me when it happens and it just makes the job look totally unprofessional & amateurish. To do everything I possibly can to make sure that there are no overlaps, I coat the floor in small, manageable stripes and I definitely won't try and put too much colour into the mixture. Over the years, this has left me with very favorable results.
The real limiting factor with this tinting practice is the colour, as we can only really do it in either a Brown, a Red, or a bit of a combination of both.
Right now, you might be getting the feeling that tinting floors is not that great. Well, if your looking to create a fairly dark floor, or are looking to hide stains, or blend old and new sections of flooring together - It isn't. You most likely need to directly stain the boards for that.
If,on the other hand, you are happy to have a warm, soft glow of colour, evenly distributed across the floor, which gives the appearance of timber that has oxidized somewhat from the sun's UV rays, then, perhaps, tinting is for you.
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