Removing and re-staining a floor on a renovation
I have a customer with a small acid stained floor in his office building. He likes the stain so much, he is tearing out all the carpet and wants everything stained. How will the new stain blend in with the old? We will grind to remove the carpet glue. If we leave the old stain, I don't think we'll match it but if we grind it up, I'm concerned that the previous acid will affect our restaining and it will still stand out, maybe even more. The material we have been requested to use is Mineral Life Malachite. Have any of you professionals had experience with this? Thanks...
Do you have a skim material you recommend? It will be in an office and withstand medium foot traffic.
Myself, I use Colormaker floor products. Scraffino would work well in your case, but be aware that in the office scenario, you have the legs of furniture,and the wheels of the chairs which can reek havoc on your topping if you fail to install it properly. I have used it in an office situation with out any problems. To seal it I used a water/based acrylic. The type of office chairs and their wheels, might affect the lenght of warranty you would want to offer, or at a minimum, be mentioned as an area of concern for the lenght of warranty. It might be well advised to recommend those chair mats to distribute the load and wear on the topping surface.
If you leave the old floor stain then you make a lot of issues for yourself. 1st you will have a joint between old and new... takes a lot of skill/ time to blend.... if possible. 2cd you will always have the old being compared with the new as they will be side by side. Colour can be close even the same, but time will affect the richening and depth of colour changes so there will always be a difference. 3rd is the sealer/wax finish... that will impact the look. My recommendations is to grind the whole floor and lighlty skim with micro topping to give a "whole" new canvas. Cost won't be prohibitive and the result whether a little lighter or darker will not matter as there is nothing to campare it too except maybe a photo of the old floor. The focus of your job will completely be different if the "old" is gone.