Tips on Giving Your Hardwood Floors New Life
Preparation
My hardwood floors had been covered with carpet, so the first task was to remove the carpet, padding, and tack strips (the ones around the edge of the floor that hold the carpet down and give it tension). I recommend cutting the carpet into strips about 3′ wide, and at a length that results in a manageable carrying weight. Just roll it up and carry it out. This goes pretty quickly; I removed about 800 square feet of carpet myself in about an hour.
Repeat the process with the carpet padding, then remove the tack strips using a small pry bar and hammer. Be careful not to damage the hardwood, but don’t worry too much if you create a couple of dings. You’ll be sanding the floor, so a couple of slips are not disastrous.
Now comes the fun part. Most likely, the carpet padding was stapled to the floor. You need to get down on your hands and knees and remove ALL of these staples using a small, standard screwdriver to pry them up and needle-nose pliers to pull them out if necessary. Any staples that leave a piece of metal embedded must be driven below the level of the hardwood using a nail set. This is tedious, but it is vital that no metal is left where it can ruin the sanding process. The good news is that it is the toughest part of the process, so once this is done the rest seems pretty easy. I also removed the baseboard from the walls so that I could get as close to the edge as possible – I planned to replace these anyway.
At various points in time, my entry way had been covered with a layer of adhesive vinyl tile over a layer of linoleum over a layer of tar paper. I struggled for about an hour trying to get these materials up with just a scraper, and was considering using some type of solvent to soften the adhesives. I ended up buying a 750-1000 watt heat gun to do the trick and it work great. Just make a couple of slow passes over a 2 square foot area, and then use the scraper. I got more accomplished in five minutes than I had in an hour without the heat gun. When you get to the tar paper, be very careful – it can ignite with the application of that much heat. I recommend keeping a spray bottle of water handy just in case.
Assessment
Now it is time to assess the condition of your flooring. Look for cupping (the individual hardwood planks are lower in the middle than on the edges). Also look for moisture damage – water or pet stains that will have a bearing on the finish you ultimately select. I’ll go into more detail about these as they become applicable to the specific processes.
Rough Sanding
Your flooring may be in good enough shape to skip this step. That is strictly a judgement call; I assume if you’re going to tackle a project of this scope you’ve sanded a couple of pieces of wood before and can determine what needs to be done to achieve the desired effect. My floors were in pretty bad shape, so I definitely needed a rough sanding and started out with 80 grit paper. If you decide you need to do a rough sanding, make a determination based on general sanding experience to determine what grade of sandpaper to start with.
Using a drum sander (which can be rented at your local do-it-yourself hardware center) is the quickest and easiest way to get the main area of the floor ready. It can be a little tricky when you start out, so I recommend starting in the part of the room that will be the least visible once the project is complete and the furniture is back in the room. The key is to start moving the machine forward BEFORE you lower the drum onto the floor, so that you’re in motion when the sandpaper grabs. Try this a couple of times before you start any long passes on the floor. You’ll get the feel of it pretty quickly.
If your flooring is cupped, the first sanding should be done at a diagonal to the layout of the planks. Mentally lay out the room into four triangles by visualizing two lines drawn corner to corner, intersecting in the middle. The general idea is to work out from the center towards the corners so that you can get as close to the walls as possible with the drum sander. However, don’t start directly on your imaginary line – do one pass a couple of feet over the line, the next pass a couple of feet shy of the line and alternate as you go. This way you won’t end up with a discernible cross sanded into the floor. After you’ve made one full pass at the entire floor, take a look to see if it needs another. You will also need to sweep the sawdust from the work area as necessary.
When you determine that you have dealt with any cupping issues, use the drum sander along the grain of the wood.
Again, draw an imaginary line bisecting the room into two halves perpendicular to the direction of the wood grain. Work from the center out as before, alternating passes between going a little over and a little under the line.
If you have any moisture damage on the floor, you may want to give these a little extra sanding – but be very careful not to overdo it. You don’t want to end up with a big dip in the middle of your living room floor, and chances are any stain that didn’t come out with the first or second pass goes too deep to remedy.
You’ll notice the floor around the edges were not reachable with the drum sander. You can rent a heavy duty disk (rotary) sander to take care of these areas. Adapt the same techniques based on the need for dealing with cupping and moisture damage as with the drum sander. Remember that the final passes need to go with the grain of the wood, so you will end up with a consistent finish all the way around. You may want to invest in kneepads for this task. I didn’t, and regretted it for a couple of weeks.
Fine Sanding
You will obviously need a finer grade of sandpaper than you did for the rough sanding – I switched to 100 grit for the first pass and used 150 grit for the final pass. Use the same tools and basic techniques in the same order as you did for the second part of the rough sanding – in other words; there is no need to sand on the diagonal in this phase.
The last part of this stage requires a different machine, also available as a rental. It is basically the same machine used to buff linoleum floors, but is equipped so that a round piece of sandpaper with an adhesive backing can be applied to the pad underneath. I did my final sanding using 180 grit sandpaper. This machine also takes a little getting used to, so start in the least visible spot in the room.
The trick here is to NOT try and use your weight to control the machine. The pad rotates with a lot of torque, and can whip a 200 pound man right of his feet. Trust me; I know…and before you ask, there is no video record of this. Use the rotation of the pad to direct the machine by lifting the handle on the side opposite of the direction you want the machine to go. In other words, if you want to sand to the right, lift the left side of the handle. Sounds a little strange, but you’ll get used to it very quickly. In this phase, sand in the direction of the grain, using as wide a pass as you can comfortably make given the size and shape of the room. Because of the round shape of the sandpaper, you won’t be able to get the corners with this machine. I used a hand-held orbital sander with a square sanding surface to get to these small areas.
Now is the time to decide what your final finish is going to be if you have not done so already. I knew that I was going to apply a semi-gloss polyurethane as the last step, so did not need to go any further with preparing for the staining phase of the project. If you intend to use a high gloss finish, you may want to use a regular buffing pad next to get a really smooth surface on the raw wood.
Selecting and Prepping for Stain
The most popular look currently seems to be a natural finish, or perhaps a very light stain. Due to moisture damage having left some markings on my floor, I elected to go with a darker stain to camouflage these areas. Make sure you get ALL the sawdust off the floor before you start to stain. Use a broom, and then vacuum to get the dust out of the cracks, followed by at least one damp (not wet) mopping, possibly two. I suggest letting the floor dry overnight and avoid walking on it. This time period will vary depending on your weather.
Applying Stain
Ensure that the space is well ventilated – this stuff stinks, and it’s probably not good to inhale the fumes. When you’re certain the floor is dry, free of dust and other debris you can begin to apply the stain. I actually read the directions on the side of the can before I started (surprised?) but didn’t follow them to the letter (still surprised?). After a little trial and error on my designated test spot, I decided to use a pad designed to apply stain, attached to the end of a long handle. The assembled tool is available where you purchased the rest of the materials, and will be used to apply the varnish or polyurethane coat. I used a paint tray for the stain, dipped the pad into it and pushed the stain into the wood with a back and forth motion and a little bit of pressure until I got the tone I wanted. As usual, make sure you go with the grain of the wood.
I recommend allowing the stain to dry overnight, again depending on your climate. You’ll notice the color changes a little as it dries; if you feel like a second application is necessary to achieve the color you want, just repeat the process.
Final Finish
Now that the stain is dry, you’re ready to apply the finish coats. I went with a polyurethane product for its durability; it seems to be the most popular and easy to find. Varnish may be an option, but rumor has it that it’s a little bit tough to work with. I have no personal experience to draw upon, so will confine the discussion to the poly product. The manufacturer recommended using a lamb’s wool pad to apply the finish, but when I found myself picking lint out of the finish coat every couple of minutes I switched to a synthetic pad.
Making sure the space is well ventilated; use a paint tray and the same tool as used to apply the stain, and in pretty much the same manner. The difference is you don’t want to apply any pressure; let the weight of the tool do the work. Keep the pad wet enough to glide over the floor easily, and apply one coat at a time with long, even strokes. If you see bubbles forming on the surface, go over it lightly until they’re gone.
It is typically recommended that you apply at least three coats. I got impatient and only applied two, and my floor looks great – keeping in mind that I opted for the semi-gloss finish. If you’re going for a super glossy finish, let the second coat dry and cure for a few days, machine buff it, damp mop, let dry thoroughly, then apply a very thin third coat.
Other Useful Stuff…
Before I refinished my hardwood floors I had removed an unused floor furnace and grate. This left a gaping hole in my hallway. I was trying to figure out how to put down new flooring to blend in, when a friend suggested we go in the exact opposite direction. We ended up cutting a piece of sub-floor to the dimensions of the area I needed to cover, then attached supporting pieces of 2×4 inside the floor joists that surrounded the gap to support it at the proper height. We then nailed new oak flooring around the top edges of the piece of subfloor to frame it in, and cut and nailed more flooring between the frame we had created. The end result is a hatch that I now use as access to the crawl space beneath the house. I finished it off by attaching a brass pull ring to the top of the piece that folds flush with the surface of the floor (available from marine hardware stores, and can be ordered on-line).
If your floor is badly damaged, you may want o consider going for the “distressed” look before you give up and cover it with some other type of flooring. There are a variety of methods I can suggest, and you can probably come up with a few of your own. For the best effect, insert this step just before you do the final, light sanding.
Try using chains of various weights and simply strike the floor in a criss-cross pattern. You can also use a cloth bag filled with nails, screws, coins, ball bearings, or any other metal object that isn’t going to tear the bag to shreds after a couple of whacks. Distressing your wood floor can result in a bit of a rustic look that will add some charm (and value) to your home.
