My husband and I bought a home last year that was built in 1880. It was time to rip up the carpet to see what was underneath and there is a hard wood floor. It obviously needs a lot of work since they had glued linoleum tile on it years back.
My question is since it's the only layer of wood between the basement and the room (1 inch thick boards) is it a bad idea to sand it and refinish it and use it as the floor instead of putting new wood on top? I'd like to refinish it but there are some gaps that would need to be filled in and it would need re-staining etc. Any advice would be great.
Jen from Cincinnati, Ohio
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Today i bought a product at Fred Meyers called Rejuvinate Floor Restorer and Proctectant. I want to try it on the 100 year old floors of the house I inherited from my mother. It is around $12 for a 16 0z bottle that should go a long way. I won't be home for about a month, but after trying it, i will let you know if it works. It is made by Life Products www.forlifeproducts.com.
My partner and I bought a 50+ year old house that had original wood floors under the "stylish" shag carpet. What I have been doing as I take the carpet up is to clean it really well, then I fill in any gaps with clear caulk. Once the caulk dries I sand any areas that are particularly "bad" and then I clean the floors again. Then I have been using Minwax poly that gives a build quick so I do have to go days and days at a time doing 5 or 6 coats; normally two does just fine.
HTH -- MtM
I just refinished 2 rooms of hardwood flooring. I took my sister's advice and didn't sand. One room had old varnish and stain on it, the other lots of carpet glue. I used an adhesive remover for the glue, and a furniture re finisher instead of sanding. If you sand, it takes the color out, and being old wood, you'd have to sand much of the boards away. You pour some of the re finisher in a glass jar, use a paint brush to work it around and wipe the old stain/varnish up with a rag. you'd now ready to put the sealer on. It's a beautiful pecan/golden oak color..one you couldn't match in the store with stain.
The gaps in your floor is what I have in our bedrooms. They built floors with the gaps to save on lumber. You could fill them in with clean caulk as someone suggested to help prevent dirt getting into the cracks. Good luck...it's a Big job, but well worth it.
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We recently purchased our home. It has hardwood floors in the kitchen and hallways but hasn't been treated in years. I'm not sure if I need to sand it or not. Any tips?
It's hard to tell if they "need" to be sanded or not without seeing them. If the floors are not too bad, but you want them to have a fresh look. A light sanding and 2 -3 new coats of polyurethane will do the trick. If there are places that the poly has been completely worn off,(high traffic areas) then you will need to do a complete sanding. Sanding is a big job, although not as bad as it once was. There are some much better sanders to rent out there now.
Liz (01/17/2007)
By Liz Orr
Try using SKID SAFE Water Based Sealer/Finish with ND Aggregate TM which I have successfully used on my hardwood floors, concrete driveway, and painted garage floors, and in my ceramic tile bathroom.
These materials were very slippery wet before I used these amazing products, and now they are not slippery either WET nor DRY !
SKID SAFE Water Based Sealer/Finish.
I have used them for over 8 years ! See www.ndclean.com, the manufacturer/creator since 1986. (02/15/2008)
