How To Clean Old Paint From Hardwood Floors

Q: My oak floors are covered in scratches. Do I have to sand down to bare forest to get rid of them?

—Susan Bankhead, Meridian, Idaho

A: The Editors of This Erstwhile House reply: Non necessarily. If the scratches don't go all the way through to the wood, yous can scuff-sand your floors with a buffer and apply a fresh coat or two of end. The hardwood flooring refinishing process is easier and less expensive than sanding down to blank wood and takes less fourth dimension. In a few hours, your floors will expect as good as new.

The job requires using a buffer, which you can rent at a home center, and a vacuum to suck upwards dust. Buffing hardwood floors tin be catchy, and so if you've never used a buffer before, practice in the middle of the room until y'all get a feel for how to maneuver it.

Once the cease is roughed up, we put on a water-based polyurethane, which can be recoated in three hours. Oil-based polys are cheaper, but each coat takes well-nigh 8 hours to dry. With either terminate, we recommend a fresh coat every 2 years or whenever the flooring looks worn. Stick to that routine and your floors volition never wear out.

Pro Tip to Forbid Discoloration: Sometimes the tannins from your forest floor react to h2o-based polyurethane, causing discoloration. To avert this, apply a base of operations coat before applying your h2o-based poly. Smooth the base glaze out evenly around the edges with a pigment brush. (Don't brush as well fast or you may create bubbles, which volition show in the stop.) Smoothen out the rest of the flooring with a constructed flooring finish applicator and give your base of operations coat about two hours to dry.

Here are some additional mutual questions we've come across:

How much does information technology cost to sand and refinish hardwood floors yourself?

If you lot plan on DIY-ing your hardwood floors, expect to pay a little less than $500 per 275 sq. feet. The average range tends to be between $1,000 to $2,400.

The total toll includes renting sanding equipment along with purchasing sanding pads, wood stain, brushes and finish.

Is it cheaper to refinish or supplant hardwood floors?

You can near e'er bet that refinishing is cheaper than replacing hardwood floors. With the latter, yous'd be paying not merely for the new wood but also for the labor of ripping out the old woods and toting it away.

What Are The Steps To Refinishing Hardwood Floors?

Read these six steps for refinishing the wood floors in your domicile:

1. Clean the Floor with a Hardwood Floor Cleaner

Person Using Microfiber Flat Mop On Hardwood Floor

Remove all the furniture, and spray the floor with a hardwood flooring cleaner or your own mix of 10 parts water to ane part white vinegar.
Gently wipe the flooring with a terry-fabric mop or a towel wrapped around a mop caput.
Shut the windows and doors to keep grit contained in the room you're sanding.

two. Prep the Perimeter

Man Hand-Sanding Perimeter Of Hardwood Floor With SandPaper

Using 180-grit sandpaper, paw-sand the perimeter of the room and any nooks that the buffer can't reach.
Rub with the grain 4 to 6 inches out from the baseboard, working over each board until the terminate dulls and a pulverization forms.

Pro Tip: Don't use a sanding block for refinishing hardwood—it might miss uneven spots in the floor.

3. Scuff-sand the Floor Finishing

Stick a maroon buffing pad to the buffer, and put on a dust mask.
Move the buffer from side to side across the floor in the direction of the grain, overlapping each course by vi inches.
The sometime finish turns to pulverization equally you go, so information technology's easy to run into the areas you've covered.
Proceed the buffer moving at all times, but cease every 5 minutes or then and vacuum the pad.

4. Vacuum and Tack

Man Dry-Tacking The Floor With Microfiber Cloth

Go out the room for 10 to 15 minutes to let the powder settle.
Put a clean filter in the vacuum, and sweep the flooring using a felt-bottomed attachment.
Piece of work in line with the floor strips, and then sweep across them to get any powder that settled between the boards.
Finally, dry-tack the flooring with a microfiber cloth pushed with the grain.

five. Cut in Along the Edges

Paint Brush Applying Finish Around Corners Of Hardwood Floor

Cover your shoes with booties and your olfactory organ and oral cavity with a respirator that has organic vapor canisters.
Strain the terminate through a cone filter into a make clean plastic watering can, minus a sprinkler caput, then pour some strained cease into a small-scale plastic container.
Castor a iii-inch-wide stripe beside the baseboards at a point farthest from your go out door.
You'll have lap marks if the border of the stripe starts to dry, then stop later 10 minutes and go to the next footstep.

six. Roll Out the Poly

Man Using Paint Roller With Extension To Apply Polyurethane On Hardwood Floor

Pour out a 1-inch-wide stripe of finish in line with the grain—only every bit much as y'all can spread in 10 minutes.
Using a long-handled roller with a ¼-inch nap embrace, roll out the stop with the grain, then across it.
Overlap each pass and work apace to continue a wet edge.
After 10 minutes, brush more finish forth the border, and then pour and roll over again for ten minutes. Go on until the floor is covered.
Wait 3 hours before recoating and a week before putting dorsum furniture.

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