Woodworking - Hardwood Floor Refinishing Project

The first project I started was the kitchen cabinets, which is still in progress and I'll blog on later. The second project was the hardwood floor refinishing. The steps involved with this project take about a week per room start to finish.

Step 1 - Remove all furniture from the room

You are left with a distressed floor and a happy hound Lucy

Pretty evident that this floor needed redone

Step 2 - Rent a drum sander and edge sander. I used Arts Rental, everyone else had them all rented out

Step 3 - Use the large drum sander to sand the "field" and the edge sander on the perimeter. It took me several passes with the drum sander to get it all the way down to wood. 

Step 4 - Switch to a finer grit sand paper to smooth out the rough sanding. Again, took me a few passes to smooth it out.

Step 5 - Once you have it sanded to a smooth face, take your time getting it swept and cleaned up, I used tack cloth to do a final wipe down.

Step 6 - Apply pre-stain wood conditioner to the now bare wood floor.

Hard to tell in this picture, but the pre-stain makes the wood appear damp. It's meant to prevent blotchiness and even the stain's penetration.

Step 7 - Apply first coat of stain. I used a Wooster 2" synthetic brush to apply with the grain of each board. Then let it set for a few minutes and take a rag to wipe up whatever hasn't soaked into the wood, again wipe with grain of the wood to avoid streaking.

Step 8 - Apply second coat of stain. We decided that we wanted a darker finish after the first coat had dried so we applied a second coat, repeating the process of step 7.

Difference between 1 coat and 2 coats of stain

Difference between unstained and 2 coats of stain

Step 9 - After the stain is no longer tacky, you can apply the first coat of Polyurethane. The poly that I chose only takes 2 coats for maximum protection.

Step 10 - After the polyurethane has had an opportunity to dry, at least a day, you can do a light sanding with 120 grit sand paper and I used an orbital sander. After you carefully clean up all the dust, you can apply the second coat.

 Step 11 - Depending on conditions, 72 hours (or more) later you're done! Unfortunately for me, I'm only 1/2 way done. Now I have to move all the furniture from the living room to the dining room and do it all over again in the other room. Here are some pics of the finished dining room.