# Hardwood Floor refinish



## reikimaster (Sep 29, 2005)

I'm looking for opinions and suggestions. I have a house built in 1960. We are uncovering hardwood floors through the whole place that have been under wall-to-wall carpeting for quite some time. The floors clean up nicely and are generally in good shape, but the finish is about gone. I don't believe urethanes were beginning to be used until somewhere in the mid 60s so I *think* this flooring is probably finished with varnish or shellac. In closets, where it has been protected more, the finish is still there. In the rooms it's hard to tell if there's any finish left at all. The wood appears to be oak. I'll measure the width when I get home but I'd say it's 1-1/2 to 2 inch wide at most.

Here's where I'm going.... I can't move out to have the floors refinished. I just can't. I would PREFER not to have to sand the floors down and start over. And here's the part some of you might find odd... I would PREFER to wax the floors. I've recently been (in the last 2 years up to now) in several older homes where the floors were oiled and then waxed. They look beautiful and more than one of these homes is over 100 years old. There's a lot to be said for the wax finishes. 

I'm thinking about using Fiddes Hard Wax Oil. It dries in 4 to 6 hours. It's oil and wax combined. Oil penetrates and wax stays on top to protect. once that's on I can just wax when needed to freshen it up. I have a floor buffer to make rewaxing easier. I know it involves rewaxing every couple months when new but I also know from speaking to the owners of those homes that as long as you don't OVERwax.... which then requires stripping... the floors become "conditioned" and now they only rewax once a year or once every 2 years with some spot refreshes in high traffic areas. 

So.... do you think I can do this without sanding the floors down and starting from scratch? If I put a drop of water on the floor (not in a closet), it doesn't stay beaded for more than a minute before I see it starting to soak into the wood. In a closet it lasts about 5 minutes. If I put isopropyl alcohol on the floor in the closet, it forms a white ring but doesn't get sticky or start to strip the finish. 

I would LOVE it if I only needed to sand out the closets a bit and then could wipe the floors down with white spirit and then apply the hard wax oil.

thoughts?


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## dutchman 46 (May 23, 2007)

Hello Charlie: I recently refinished a living room that had carpet on it for 30 years. The finish was dark then, when We carpeted it. The carpet was worn and We removed it last year. We needed to start with stripping down of fresh wood. We rented a sander and stripped it, and refinished with urethane. First staining the wood, and then clearing it. It looks great. and I don't know of anything that can be done without stripping first!


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## Ralph Barker (Dec 15, 2008)

I agree with Howard, Charlie - I think you'll be better off to strip the old finish and give the bare wood a fine sanding before proceeding. If you can arrange to do one room at a time, that would minimize the headache. 

When I bought a place in 1973, it, too, had hidden oak flooring. I decided to start with the master bedroom. Not realizing there were big sanders that could be rented, I worked with the 4x24 belt sander I had. Then, took it down to 320 on a half-sheet finish sander, before staining it with a mix of Rosewood and Teak. Three coats of polyurethane with wet-sanding at 600 in between coats. Three months of hard labor later, I quickly re-carpeted the other rooms that had oak floors. One room was more than enough with that method. An occasional waxing after that was all that was needed.

But, the good news is that when I sold the place in 2005, the floor still looked newly refinished.

If you "varnish" rather than just oil and wax, there are more durable finishes than poly for floors.


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## reikimaster (Sep 29, 2005)

It's the drying/curing time that kills me. A lot of the urethanes are telling me to not put furniture back in the room for 7 days. That just won't work for us...especially when I do the living room which you HAVE to walk through to get from the kitchen/eating area to the bedrooms and bathrooms.

And I really don't like the urethanes. They make the floor look like plastic. I can't describe how beautiful the old wood floors were. So rich and warm and teh wax gave them a sheen that says, "Someone lives here". 

The other nice thing about the wax finish is that you don't have to refinish. You don't have to sand and recoat. You just rewax and buff. It's VERY easily repairable if it gets wor or scratched.

I'm still kinda thinking I'll have to sand first though.


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## reikimaster (Sep 29, 2005)

OK, well, I've been looking into the hard wax oil refinishing process and I'm still going to have to sand the floors. Not sure if it's worth renting a floor sander and doing it myself or hiring out the sanding. If I'm going to be moving furniture, pulling up carpeting, removing shoe moldings, etc, it might be a good time to think about replacing all the wood trim which is another project I was going to tackle. 

It's just one thing after another I suppose....

If you haven't looked at hard wax oil as a wood finish, you might want to look at it. Non-toxic. Food safe. Baby toy safe. Easily refreshed.


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## Ralph Barker (Dec 15, 2008)

Removing baseboard mouldings - yep, you want to sand under them. Whether you can save and re-use them is a matter in the hands of the Refurbishing Gods. If they are of an unusual pattern, at least one section will break (I think that's sub-item 47 under Murphy's Law).


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## baileyedition (Feb 2, 2011)

Use a water based finish. Its much clearer than the urethanes providing a bit more modern feel and is much brighter. The smell is near nothing and wont drive you out of the house. Any method you choose you are right to believe you should sand back to fresh wood. The biggest reason for this will be compatibility of the finish. You have no idea what has been on that floor, spilled through the carpet etc., plus for the simple fact you cant possibly hope to have a nice finish without a smooth surface to begin with. 

Go room by room and you wont have to wait seven days but you will want to put down about 4 0r 5 coats. You can easily get on two to three a day and then although it wont be fully cured, feel it, if its not tacky and feels firm, probably a day or two, carefully move in your furniture and move to the next room. 

I would obviously start with the bedrooms in the back and work your way to the kitchen area. Be prepared for take out for a couple nights or move the microwave into a bedroom or bathroom while the living room is done.


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## baileyedition (Feb 2, 2011)

Oh when its sanded back dont forget to go around and check for squeaks this is your chance to fix those


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## dutchman 46 (May 23, 2007)

We did Our House complete! All floors except the kitchens, and bathrooms, Well worth it! My Daughter helped sand. We used the large sanders that Menard's rents. The action is oscillating disk, 10 in. Random orbital. Your Wife can help You as well. It's work, is well within Your ability to do. We had to stop in the middle of our living room to be able to use the bathroom. The floor looks great, and I can't tell where I stopped. Allowed it to dry for a few days, and then finished the rest. The edge of a floor board is all You need, and overlap the last board with the clear coat to make the blend disappear


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## derek willis (Jan 21, 2009)

*finishing floors.*

Let me put my twopennor'th in, some yuears ago when I was working I did a lot of re-furbishment,
do re-sand your floors,
do, do it yourself 
do hire a floor sander,
do hire an edging sander, do not remove skirting boards, (baseboards),
Do make sure you go through the different grades, in your case rough to medium and then fairly fine,
We only ever finished floors with wax, and gave a very good finish, whether liquid or paste, we used paste,
do not hurry, take your time and you will have the most professional job ever.


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