Here is what maple hardwood floors look like. Maple is a lot lighter looking wood vs. oak, or Douglas fur. Most houses build before the 1940s are going to have maple hardwood floors. They don’t have a lot of grains and are usually a more dense wood then oak. They are difficult to sand and refinish, but they can really look nice.
The two picture above are maple floors in a 1920s, two story. They are not the original floors, they were installed years back. But we also sanded and coated the dining room and living room floors. In the picture below you can see the difference in look. The older floors have more gaping and are a little darker because they have aged.
The two picture below are red oak hardwood floors. Look at all the grains in the wood. There all over the place. As a result, oak is going to hide more imperfections then maple. These oak floors were in Minneapolis, in a really nice 1940s colonial two story over by Minnehaha Creek. I loved the house and the customers were really nice. They just had a bedroom that they were turning into an office.
In the picture above this is one coat of sealer, but an oil finish coat has not been applied yet. Below, we just got done putting the final coat on the floors. It looks nice.
