How To Fix Chips In Wood Flooring

If you’re the proud owner of a lovely new wood floor, there’s nothing more annoying than discovering some accidental scratching or chips.  An inevitable part of life, accidents do happen and chips in wood flooring do occur.  How to fix a chip in your wood flooring, depends to a large extent on how serious the chip is.  If the chip is extremely deep, there’s no getting round it, you’re either going to have to hide it with a rug or a piece of furniture, get the professionals in to see if they can camouflage it or in the worst case scenario, replace the plank of wood flooring.

That said, if the chip isn’t too deep, the likelihood is you’ll be able to tackle it yourself.  There are several options, including floor markers, floor oils and good old-fashioned sanding (and filling if necessary) followed by a localised re-finish.

Wood stain markers are readily available in pretty much all DIY shops and are a real saviour when it comes to scratches and chips in wood flooring.  To fix a minor chip in wood flooring, you should go to your DIY shop and pick up some wood stain markers.  No matter how good you are on colour, unless you can take a sample of your flooring to the shop with you, it’s a good idea to pick up two or three markers to make sure you get the best possible colour match for your floor.  They’re reasonably cheap, so this won’t break the bank and you’ll find that, particularly with an older floor, the variation in colour across the entire floor is greater than you’d imagine.  Once you’ve brought your markers home, test them in an “out of sight” spot on your wood flooring to see which matches best.  Thereafter, simply follow the instructions on the marker to watch the scratch or chip disappear before your eyes.

Another really effective way to fix scratches and chips on your wooden floor is to apply a light coating of oil to the floor to help make them disappear.  That said, if your chip or scratch is particularly deep, you’ll probably need to either sand or rub the affected area with steel wool, making sure to always work in the direction of the wood’s grain.  Once you’ve levelled off the scratch or chip, be sure to remove any dust from the area before applying some of your original stain to the damaged area.  You can use either a small paintbrush or a cotton wool stick to apply the stain.  Make sure you apply enough stain to fill the crevice and let it dry thoroughly before buffing it with a soft cloth.