Expert: Eileen Cronk - 3/4/2009

Question
QUESTION:  We had some water damage to the kitchen of the vacent home of my mother-in-law. The insurance refused to cover the damage. What is the best way to refinish the kitchen walls which are knotty pine, also the oak floors in the bedrooms were also damaged. I know its going to take a lot of elbow grease. Any ideas on what kind of finish is on the knotty pine? thanks for all your help

ANSWER: Hi Carolyn
Nice to hear from you.
Sorry this has happened.
I need to know what type of damage.
Are the floors and pine showing dark or black water stains?
If this is real panelling (4x8 sheets applied to the walls) and not pine boards, there is no way to fix it short of cleaning, priming and painting.
You will need a primer such as KILZ (Canadian) which covers such stains but there are others.
If the oak floors are darkened, they will need to be sanded and possibly bleached and refinished.
If you could supply more details it would be great.
Regards
Eileen


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thank you so much for your answer, the damage is water from a leaking roof. The paneling is pine boards ( from the 50's)
so far there is no dark stains and part of finish has popped off, the floor(oak), the grain has raised some, I know they will need to be sanded and finished. thanks for all your help
Carolyn


Answer
Hi Again Carolyn
If the finish has just come off the boards, and there appears to be no discoloration of the wood it can be sanded and a fresh finish applied.
You asked what kind of finish the boards may have had.
For certain it will be an oil based finish.
Could be varnish, shellac or possibly urethane. I know we had urethane in the 60's but not certain about the 50's.
So you can be safe in applying a fresh coat of oil based poly.
Good Luck
Regards
Eileen