|
attic, part 6:
refinishing the hardwood floor
it's not a "mistake", it's "character"
There's a reason that
every time we mentioned that we were refinishing our hardwood floors
ourselves, we were greeted with incredulousness. Turns out that it's every
bit as backbreaking, messy, long, and arduous and you might expect it to
be. And I say that as the one who didn't have to do any of the work
-- with the exception of cleaning it with a tack cloth between sandings, I
did exactly nothing on this project.
Once we'd finished taping
and sanding/mudding the main room and sanding the closets, we decided it
was time to sand down the floor even though we wouldn't be refinishing it
until we were done texturing and
painting. The idea was to completely wrap
up as much of the sanding projects as we could in one go since it's so
much work to clean up and we wouldn't want it causing problems during our
finish work later on.
The floor was in
reasonable shape when we first started working on the attic, though it
acquired a grimy layer of sawdust, drywall dust and dried drywall mud over
the course of the project.
Underneath all of that,
though, we knew there was treasure just waiting to be discovered. The
floor is made of fir, as is most of the rest of the woodwork in the house,
and it has a wonderful varying grain that's quite lovely. We
rented a floor sander, an edger, and a huge stack of sandpaper of varying
grits and then over the course of three days, Sal worked from morning to
late evening to get the floor to its bare beauty.
We then covered the floor
using big rolls of brown paper (a tip from my friend, Steve) and proceeded
to texture, prime, and paint the walls of the main room, prime and paint
the eave closets, and install the vinyl floor tiles in the closets. Using
the paper made cleanup very easy when we were ready to get back to the
floor and in the meantime, let us work worry-free on our other projects.
Once we were ready to
finish the floor, it was time for another trip back to the rental place
for the finish sander (screener). By the way, mad props to
Interstate Rentals over on
Schmeer Road for some damn fine service, who, in addition to renting good
equipment at reasonable prices and doing it with a smile, also provide an
excellent tutorial, both in person and online, for the
step-by-step process of refinishing a floor.
There was a final sanding
pass, followed by meticulous cleaning with a broom and then a tack cloth.
Incidentally, we saved time on this phase by putting the tack cloth on our Swiffer, which worked remarkably well (great idea of Sal's).
Finally -- finally! -- it
was time for the Application of Noxious Chemicals. (Safety tip for the
kiddies: that means you need to don Mr. Respirator so that nasty Mr. Fumes
doesn't knock you out.) After much online research, consulting of friends
with experience, and several phone calls to two local floor refinishing
companies, we decided to use three coats of a clear satin-finish
water-based polyurethane and a fourth coat of water-based sealer. Some
feel that oil-based is more durable, but we both hate dealing with the
cleanup of oil-based anything and avoid it whenever possible. The floor
refinishing companies both confirmed that water-based products would be
just fine for our application. They also told us we only needed one or two
coats, but we opted for three to up the durability a bit. It took longer,
but the difference was noticeable between that second and third coat and
it was worth it.
Counting the initial
sanding, the whole project took six very long days and another three days
or so before it was really ready for any kind of serious foot traffic.
Obviously, we tackled an especially large room for our first floor
refinishing project (when will we learn not to do that??) but it's not
something I would recommend doing yourself unless you've got several days
off in a row. Also, we were able to close it off from the rest of the
house so we didn't have to live "around" it while it was being done.
Anyway, once the sealer
coat was on and had dried for a few hours, we were rewarded with the floor
we've been dreaming about since we moved into this house and
had hoped to see downstairs, back when we were
young and naive. The final result, which is stunning, is due entirely to
Sal's hard work and he more than deserves all the credit for how it turned
out.
I particularly love the
way the color of the wood changes to a split-tone down the centers of some
of the planks, as well as all the variation in grain and range of color.
There was originally a slightly darker stain on the floor but we chose to
go with a clear finish that really lets the wood's natural color sing.
Also, we're glad we chose the more subtle sheen of the semi-gloss, which
makes the floor somehow appear and even feel soft underfoot.
|
