Quarter round question

[Flippers4pups]

Awesome work! You should be proud of that work, and you know for sure it is done right!

Thank you, I hope you get a proper resolution for their work! No one should be done that way.

 

[SandJ]

Quarter rounds should not be miter cut on inside corners. One should be straight cut, the other coped round to fit perfectly over the other. Outside corners should be mitered and dressed to perfect length on a mitered sander if the cut is not within 1/64" or 0.1mm. A false square with a protractor should be used if the outside corners are not perfectly square to calculate the cutting angles. Your pictures look as though it was done by an impatient builder. Those outside corners should have been finished with putty. No excuse for that gap behind the quarter round. I do masonry, carpentry, painting, furniture refinishing and basic renovation. Only small jobs because I'm a one man band. Currently I'm redoing a bathroom floor and laminate ceiling for a lady who's entrepreneur made a disaster, took her money and walked away. Not too many entrepreneurs think long term. A quick buck today and bankrupt tomorrow because people are starting to read those Google reviews. Use it. Don't get emotional and just bash. Quantify the faults and be specific about the details.

Mark

Thanks for the tips! I have used the coping saw on crown moulding, but I did not realize it would work on quarter round. Off to watch some YouTube videos.

 

[SandJ]

I've worked on multi million dollar new single family houses and high end commercial buildings back then. There isn't any "redo" if you want to continue working in that field!

I agree there's a lack of talent and training in the construction trades, even union.

Companies that do shawty work don't stay in business long. Word of mouth travels far and wide, especially with social media.

I'd demand that they redo their work or go to the better business bureau and report them or get a lawyer.

I did demand a redo, and the pictures in the first post were the corrected work. When I asked that the work in that first picture be redone for the third time, that is when they said that they did not think they could please me and we would need to work out other arrangements because they could not do any better job and seen nothing wrong with the work done.

 

[Flippers4pups]

I did demand a redo, and the pictures in the first post were the corrected work. When I asked that the work in that first picture be redone for the third time, that is when they said that they did not think they could please me and we would need to work out other arrangements because they could not do any better job and seen nothing wrong with the work done.

The other option would be to get a estimate from another company to redo the trim work. Take that to small claims court to sue the company that did the bad job.

 

[Copingwithpods]

The outside corners need to be back coped so they will mesh perfectly. Not hard, takes a few seconds per joint with a coping saw. On the inside corner, first piece goes in square then miter and cope the second piece for a perfect fit. Again just takes a minute or two per joint. Doing it right is faster than puttying and sanding. Man this world needs to start valuing trades people again. Sorry your going through this pain.

This is so true, now a days and honestly since the 2008 dive I'm hired more for my speed than I am for my skill. People now a days don't want a level 5 patch they just want it done quick and cheap with liveable results. When you quote them the real price to get it done right you're sent packing.

 

[Mark Novack]

Thanks for the tips! I have used the coping saw on crown moulding, but I did not realize it would work on quarter round. Off to watch some YouTube videos.

I have learned so much from YouTube. A great place to find skilled tradesmen sharing their knowledge.

 

[CollectOyster04]

As a wood floor professional myself, I always tell my customers it never matters what I think, they're the ones that have to live on it / see it everyday, so if they're not happy with something, we're going to fix it. We are held to a different standard than most in my town, and we deal with some of the most "particular" customers known to man.
With that said, I'm in no way condoning this job, or dismissing any complaints about it, but I would like to point out to everyone else other than the OP, that these pics appear to be pretty close up. One can not even see the top of the base boards (as opposed to Flipper4pups pic). Taking pics this close doesn't always give a fair representation of problem areas. If one was looking at something like this from a standing position, it would look different than a pic taken 6-12" away.
For reference, standard base shoe (which is what this appears to be) is ½x¾". Quarter round would be ¾x¾". With the shoe being ½" thick, those gaps aren't as large as one would first imagine just glancing at the pics. Again, I am not defending the job in question at all. Just saying that close up pics like this make these kinds of issues appear a lot worse than they would in person. For the floors themselves, the National Wood Flooring Association (yes, it's a thing), basically has a standard on things not sticking out from an upright position. In my opinion, the base shoe installation is sloppy, but the pics definitely exaggerate it. And I could be mistaken if seen in person. All we have to go by is these pics.
If you need to touch your toes or drop to your knees with your nose on the floor like a bloodhound, you're grasping for straws (in general, not necessarily this situation). Always love my customers that would crawl a wood floor with pieces of tape everywhere trying to telling me things like knot holes(closed, not open) in the wood (some smaller than an eraser tip) are my imperfections and need to be fixed. No matter what though, we always go above and beyond to make them happy, even if that means educating them about characteristics of wood.
Outside of the trim, how does the rest of their job look ? Are you satisfied with the floors themselves, or are there issues with that as well ? If trim is the only concern, then that should be the only part of the bill to be contested. Am curious, was this installed by a big box type flooring store, or a local mom and pop shop ?

 

[fishguy242]

sorry to see such horrible work,even caulk,c'mon wipe it smooth w damp rag,i use the durhams rock hard putty,best wishes on refund!!!

 

[SandJ]

As a wood floor professional myself, I always tell my customers it never matters what I think, they're the ones that have to live on it / see it everyday, so if they're not happy with something, we're going to fix it. We are held to a different standard than most in my town, and we deal with some of the most "particular" customers known to man.
With that said, I'm in no way condoning this job, or dismissing any complaints about it, but I would like to point out to everyone else other than the OP, that these pics appear to be pretty close up. One can not even see the top of the base boards (as opposed to Flipper4pups pic). Taking pics this close doesn't always give a fair representation of problem areas. If one was looking at something like this from a standing position, it would look different than a pic taken 6-12" away.
For reference, standard base shoe (which is what this appears to be) is ½x¾". Quarter round would be ¾x¾". With the shoe being ½" thick, those gaps aren't as large as one would first imagine just glancing at the pics. Again, I am not defending the job in question at all. Just saying that close up pics like this make these kinds of issues appear a lot worse than they would in person. For the floors themselves, the National Wood Flooring Association (yes, it's a thing), basically has a standard on things not sticking out from an upright position. In my opinion, the base shoe installation is sloppy, but the pics definitely exaggerate it. And I could be mistaken if seen in person. All we have to go by is these pics.
If you need to touch your toes or drop to your knees with your nose on the floor like a bloodhound, you're grasping for straws (in general, not necessarily this situation). Always love my customers that would crawl a wood floor with pieces of tape everywhere trying to telling me things like knot holes(closed, not open) in the wood (some smaller than an eraser tip) are my imperfections and need to be fixed. No matter what though, we always go above and beyond to make them happy, even if that means educating them about characteristics of wood.
Outside of the trim, how does the rest of their job look ? Are you satisfied with the floors themselves, or are there issues with that as well ? If trim is the only concern, then that should be the only part of the bill to be contested. Am curious, was this installed by a big box type flooring store, or a local mom and pop shop ?

It was a local, non chain store.

The flooring job was mostly ok. They did not leave a 3/16” or larger expansion gap around the perimeter (it is touching thresholds and door jambs in places). This was after having a lengthy talk the first day about how I wanted to follow manufacturers specs so we do not void then warranty. And one piece of flooring was cut short and did not go to the quarter round.

You bring up excellent points. Yes, the pictures are close up...picture quality is sometimes reduced when photos are uploaded and I wanted others to see the issues I was referring to. These are things I seen from 15 feet away though on the redo, the original job was horrible). And it is simple to fix issues like cutting the quarter round 1/8-1/16” too long and the pieces do not touch the wall now.

Caulking/putty/wood filler will cover some of these places. But a mitered corner with a gap that has been filled in will have a flat place and not have that finished look. And my line of thinking when I do this work is if you do the job correctly you will not have do a bunch of touch up work. I feel the same way about photography...if you take a great, well exposed and composed photo from the beginning, you will not have to spend hours in photo shop making it look nice.

and to be fair, here are some not so close photos. This is their finished product minus the caulking that they said they would let me do because they are not good at it.

This corner has a gap.

 

[CollectOyster04]

I completely agree with you. If you were my customer, last thing I would want to here was that the install was "mostly ok". That's not much of a vote of confidence, lol. I have to tell my guys all the time, once a customer sees something that's not right, they will go looking for anything/ everything else. And it just snowballs. So if they see something isn't right, fix it before the customer sees it or says something about it. Real simple. Same thing about cleaning after themselves on jobs. A wise man once told me, nobody is perfect, everybody screws up. The difference is not how you screwed it up, but how you fix it. That's where you separate yourself. All of my guys are more than capable at everything they do, but at times complacency takes over, and they do something "stupid" like your issue. I have been taught though to make it right no matter the cost. Even if it's me myself out there dealing with it.
Reason I ask about the store, is that we see so many of these companies contract the work out. The bigger stores are notorious for that. It's a loophole I wish could be closed. By contracting the work out, the company gets to skip out on paying workman's comp insurance, and payroll taxes. It puts more pressure on the guys doing the work. Many will cut corners to complete jobs faster, to improve the pay per job. These "independent" contractors are then responsible for the full payroll tax and their own insurance. I've seen many that pay neither, just to pocket more. Makes it harder for guys like us that run all of the guys on our payroll (hourly). Our overhead is much higher, but I feel that I can have more quality control this way. But this is no longer a popular business model.
As I had said, I was in no way dismissing your concerns about the job. The trim install is sloppy. I loathe running trim, but I have some guys that don't mind it, and are extremely efficient at it. I always make sure they're the ones to do it.
When we finish a job, I want us to practically be friends when it's done. Nothing worse than ending a job on a bad note. All of our work comes from word of mouth or name recognition. Right now our schedule for new work is about 7-8 weeks out. I will stress to everyone to be aware of those that say they can start tomorrow. Especially in peak season like now. Sometimes there's a reason that they can start tomorrow ! And the low bid isn't always the best bid. Sometimes you do get what you pay for. Nothing worse though than paying top dollar and still getting that kind of work. It's embarrassing for a company.
Hopefully you can get a good resolution to this. For the money spent, anyone would demand a satisfactory job. I tell the guys all the time to be humble and thankful that people are willing to spend the money they do on wood floors. Hard to fathom spending enough money on flooring that could be spent buying a new car or more. I always ask them if it was their house and their money, what would they expect ?? My apologies, I'll get off my soap box now, lol. But I do sincerely hope someone makes this right for you.

 

[SandJ]

@CollectOyster04 It is like you read my thoughts. Yes, I am the customer that sees an issue and wonders what else is messed up. If I bring the issue up and the company is genuinely surprised and quick to resolve then my confidence in them is restored. Nobody is perfect.

You sound like an awesome contractor to work with and that you are instilling great values in your workers.

The clean up was also an issue. It was not even swept clean inside. They cut the vinyl planks on the sidewalk and got shavings in the flower bed (along with a cigarette butt). Clogged up a hose sprayer with leveling compound and let the water on (though the sprayer was turned off). I just felt a lack of respect for the home.

 

[LRT]

Horrible work. Did you use a licensed/insured contractor? If so you can and should file a complaint with registrar of contractors as well as contact there insurance company and file a claim.
There are certain specs and quality control that must be met it doesn't look like they even tried or cared to try.
And they cant just walk away from contracted work either. They are contracted to fulfil the contract and you should be satisfied for what you paid.

 

[slojim]

I've moved a few times. I've done some of my own floors, and I've paid someone else. The job I was happiest with was my own - I did not use any quarter round. We had wide oak trim in that house, I pulled it up and ran the floor ends under it (there was plenty of expansion room under the drywall per the flooring specs), then re-nailed the trim a little higher up. The contractors I've had balked at that, but I think it was nice, and functional - I could slide stuff almost right up against the wall. I did it because a friend had recently paid someone to put in new floor, and they left huge gaps. They ended up putting in the largest quarter round they could get, and it looked awful to me. I was feeling pretty anti-quarter round at that point.
In a bathroom, I tried the plastic/foam quarter round. It was shockingly easy to work with and to get good corners. And while it felt flimsy, it looked good and held up well.

 

[Billdogg]

I would not accept that at all. If the finish work is that poor, what about the rest of the job? That is also why I tend to do it all myself. I have no issue with paying a premium price for premium work. That job isn't.

jm.02