Refinishing timber floors is a big job, but it can completely fix how your home looks. If your wood floors are scratched, dull, or just look old, you probably have a lot of questions about how to fix them. Here’s what I found when looking at the real costs, the actual steps you have to take, and the products you need to buy.
It is not a magic process. It consists of labour, much dust and time in dry seasons. However, the point is that in this case, doing it correctly will allow you not to think about your floors in the next decade or two. This guide will bring you down to the details of what you should know about refinishing timber floors, including making a decision about whether to bother refinishing the floors or not, up to selection of the right kind of finish you should apply to your house.
When It Is Time For Refinishing Timber Floors
Wood floors are tough, but they do not last forever without a little help. Sometimes your floor just needs a good cleaning. Other times, the protective coat is completely gone. Here is how you can figure out what your floor actually needs.
The Simple Water Drop Test
This is the easiest way to check your floors. Go to a spot in your house that gets walked on a lot. This might be a hallway or right in front of the kitchen sink. Put a single drop of water on the floor.
If the water beads up and sits on top of the wood, your finish is still doing its job. You probably just need to clean the floor. But if the water soaks right into the wood and leaves a dark spot, your protective finish is gone. The wood is drinking up the water. And that’s why it matters: if it drinks up water, it will drink up dirt, pet urine, and spilled drinks. That means it is time for refinishing timber floors.
Spotting Deep Scratches and Gray Wood
Take a close look at your floors in the daylight. Surface scratches are normal. They just sit in the top clear coat. But if you have deep gouges that go all the way down to the bare wood, you have a problem. Dirt gets stuck in those gouges and makes them look black.
You should also look for gray patches. Wood turns gray when it is exposed to the air and water over a long time. It means the finish is completely worn off. If you see gray wood, you need to sand it down to fresh wood before it starts to rot.
DIY vs Hiring a Professional
So here’s what happens when people decide to fix their floors: they immediately wonder if they can do it themselves to save money. You can definitely do it yourself. But you need to know what you are getting into. Refinishing timber floors is hard physical labor.
Breaking Down the Costs
Hiring a professional will usually cost you somewhere between $3 and $8 per square foot. If you have a 500-square-foot living room, you are looking at paying a pro between $1,500 and $4,000. The price depends on where you live and what kind of finish you choose.
When you do it on your own, the prices vary. You are not paying for labor, but you have to pay for everything else. You will find it necessary to hire a drum sander and edge sander available to be hired at a hardware store. That generally costs between 60-100 a day. You also have to spend approximately 100 to 200 on the sandpaper since you wear it out. It is then necessary to purchase the finish. A good quality floor finish costs between $80 and 150 per gallon and one gallon may normally take 400 square feet. You must also have rollers, plastic tarps, masks, and brushes. Finally, it may cost around 400-600 dollars to have to do the same 500-square-foot room yourself.
The Time and Effort Factor
This might work for you if you have a lot of free time and a strong back. Sanding floors is loud, incredibly dusty, and hard on your body. You will be bent over an edge sander for hours.
In three or four days, a professional team is normally capable of demolishing a few rooms. It will need, at a minimum, two complete weekends to do it. You have a risk, too, of getting it adapted. Still landers will hump big deep holes on your timber before you take a rest. This can be circumvented by pros. Before you rent out the equipment, be frank to yourself about the skills.
The Step-by-Step Refinishing Process
If you are going to tackle refinishing timber floors yourself, or if you just want to know what the pros are doing in your house, here is the basic process.
Step 1: Prep Work and Moving Furniture
You must remove everything in the room whatsoever. You can not take the couch to the side and half the room, at a time. And that is not how it works. You must also take away the baseboards or shoe molding so that the sander can be stacked near the wall.
Test the floor by checking whether it has loose boards and nailing them down. Punch any bare nails underneath the wood with a nail punch. Then, leave a nail sticking out, and you will tear the costly sandpaper off your hired machine. Cover the doorways and air vents with plastic sheets since the dust will attempt to spread everywhere in your home.
Step 2: Sanding the Old Finish Away
This is the most difficult aspect. You apply heavy drum sander to the centre solution of the room and a smaller edge sander to align the edges. You would not sand it one time only. The floor will have to be sanded again and again with various papers.
Choosing the Right Sandpaper Grits
You always start with rough paper to strip off the old finish. This is usually a 36-grit or 40-grit paper. It takes off the old polyurethane and takes out the surface scratches. Then you vacuum the floor.
Next, you go over the whole floor again with medium paper, like 60-grit. This removes the deep scratches left by the rough paper. You vacuum again. Finally, you use fine paper, like 80-grit or 100-grit, to make the wood perfectly smooth. If you skip a step, your floor will look covered in scratch marks when you apply the finish.
Step 3: Staining the Wood (If You Want To)
You do not have to stain your floor. A lot of people just put a clear finish over the natural wood. But if you want your light oak floors to look like dark walnut, this is when you do it.
You wipe the rag or pad on, then you leave the stain to soak in a few minutes and then wipe off the remainder of the stain. Removal of excess is very crucial. When you leave patches of stain on the floor it will get sticky and your topcoat will never dry. Allow the stain to dry. This normally requires a minimum of 24 hours.
Step 4: Applying the New Finish
Once the floor is clean, bare, and perfectly dust-free, you put on the protective clear coat. You usually apply this with a long t-bar applicator or a special floor roller.
Most finishes require three coats. You put the first coat down and let it dry. Then, you lightly scuff the floor with a very fine sanding screen (like 220-grit). This knocks down any tiny wood fibers that stuck up when they got wet. You vacuum up the dust, wipe the floor with a damp cloth, and apply the second coat. You repeat this for the third coat.
Comparing Floor Finishes: Which One to Choose?
Here’s the problem a lot of people face: they get to the hardware store and have no idea what clear coat to buy. The finish you pick changes how your floor looks, how it smells while drying, and how long it lasts. Here is a breakdown of the main types.
Water-Based Polyurethane
The water-based finish is currently very popular. It appears milky when in a can but dries up clear. It will not render your wood any color. This is a good choice as long as you wish your wood to appear the way it looks when it is naked.
It dries very fast. In a few hours, you can normally apply a second coat. The perfume is also very subtle. When the house is dry, you will not need to relocate. It is however generally much pricier than oil based finish, and it is not as thick.
Oil-Based Polyurethane
This is the old-school finish. It has been around forever. It leaves a thick, hard shell on top of your wood. Oil-based finish gives wood a warm, yellowish glow. Over the years, the sun will make it turn even more amber or orange. Some people love this rich look, but others hate it.
It is very cheap and very durable. But here’s the thing: the smell is terrible. The fumes are strong and toxic. You will likely need to leave your house for a few days. It also takes a long time to dry. You usually have to wait 24 hours between coats.
Hardwax Oils
Hardwax oils are becoming very popular. Instead of sitting on top of the wood like a plastic shell, the oil soaks into the wood fibers, and the wax stays on top to protect it. Brands like Rubio Monocoat make this type of finish.
It is a totally natural finish that appears matte. You can actually feel the grain of the wood when you walk on it. The good thing is that it is not hard to repair. When your dog scratches a spot you can merely sand that single small spot and put in more oil. That is not possible with polyurethane. It is more expensive to maintain. It must be cleansed with special soap and you may need to re-oil it after every few years.
Penetrating Oils
Soap-oils such as tung oil or linseed oil sink into the wood. Their appearance is very traditional and soft. They are highly simple to use. You wip wipe them and wipe wipe them.
Little protection is provided by them. When you drop a glass of wine on a floor containing just penetrating oil, there is a high likelihood of it staining. They do not suit in large houses with children and pets.
How Finishes Compare Across 10 Categories
To make this easier, here is how those products stack up against each other in the real world. This can help you decide what actually matters for your home.
Durability, Drying Time, and Smell
- Durability and Scratch Resistance: Oil-based polyurethane is the toughest against deep scratches. Water-based is a close second. Hardwax oils show scratches, but they look more like natural wear and tear.
- Drying Time: Water based poly has won. In second or is it third hour you can walk on it in socks. Poly made on oil will require at least one day to walk, and up as much as a month to be fully swept, as well as hardened.
- Smell and Fumes: Poly and hardwax oils are water based and therefore low in fumes. Poly made of oil is stinking and the fumes could last days.
- Odor Level General: When you are an asthma sufferer or have little children, avoid the oil-based poly. Use hardwax that is based on water or that is natural.
Looks, Cost, and Fixability
- Color Changes: Oil-based poly turns wood yellow or amber. Water-based poly stays totally clear. Hardwax oils come in clear, but you can also buy them pre-tinted with dozens of colors.
- Cost: Oil-based poly is usually the cheapest per gallon. Water-based is more expensive. Hardwax oil is very expensive per can, but you usually only need one coat, so the total cost equals out.
- Ease of Application: Hardwax oil is the easiest for beginners. You literally just buff it in and wipe it off. Water-based poly is tricky because it dries so fast; if you overlap your strokes, it leaves marks.
- Spot Repair: Hardwax oil is the absolute best for this. You can fix a one-inch scratch in five minutes. With water-based or oil-based poly, fixing a scratch usually means sanding down the whole room.
- Shine and Sheen: Polyurethanes give you choices. You can get matte, satin, semi-gloss, or high gloss. Hardwax oils are almost always very matte.
- Fading in Sunlight: Water-based poly does a great job resisting UV rays from the sun. Oil-based poly will quickly turn orange in front of big windows.
Big Mistakes to Avoid When Refinishing Timber Floors
People make the same mistakes all the time when doing this job. Avoid these if you want your floor to look good.
To begin with, sanding should not be in a hurry. And when you attempt to leap out of 36-grit paper, at once, into 100-grit paper, your floor will be covered with deep scratches. And you must take the medium grits in between.
Second, pick up the dust or clean it up happening to be as you think it should be. Vacuum floor, vacuum window sills and vacuum walls. Next wipe the floor using a wet microfiber cloth. Having the dust on the floor at the time that you paint on the finish will give your floor a sandpaper feel when it is drying.
Third, do not put the finish on too thick. They believe that the thicker the coat the better. It doesn’t. A coating of polyurethane shall simply accumulate in a thick, wrinkly and will dry in weeks. Apply thin layers.
How to Keep Your Floors Looking Good
Once you finish refinishing timber floors, you want to keep them nice. It is not hard, but you have to change some habits.
Go to the store and buy felt pads for every piece of furniture in your house. Put them under the couch legs, the chair legs, and the tables. This stops 90% of scratches.
Do not use a wet mop. Water is bad for wood floors. If water gets into the seams, the wood will swell and warp. Instead, use a damp microfiber mop and a cleaner made specifically for wood floors. Never use steam mops. The heat and moisture will destroy the clear coat you just spent days applying.
Keep your dog’s nails trimmed. Dog claws are the number one enemy of fresh polyurethane.
Final Thoughts on Refinishing Timber Floors
Refinishing timber floors is dirty, loud, and takes a lot of time. But the results are usually worth it. You take something old and beaten up and make it look brand new again.
When you happen to be tight budget wise, and can handle hard work, then renting a sander and doing it on your own can save a lot of money. Simply have time about the sanding. In case you have money, but not time, it is always safe to hire a pro. Only ensure that you know the difference between water and oil poly as well as hardwax oils before you advise the contractor on what to purchase. The first secret in ensuring that you love your floors when the job is done is knowing what you want at the beginning of the job.
