Pine flooring advice please!

[RossP]

Hi all,

I've just bought my first home and although the downstairs flooring is in pretty good nick (no large gaps between boards), its very yellow; we assume a clear varnish was put on the floorboards when the house was extensively refurbished about 6 or 7 years ago. The decision has been made to hire a proper sander and redo them. I've outlined the approach I intend to take below but my question was about trying to understand all the various different stain / wax / varnish options. At the moment I'm leaning towards a couple of coats of wood stain (solvent based) and then perhaps a coat of clear varnish or wax on top.

Prep work:
- Move all furniture out of downstairs
- Lift any loose floorboards, mark where its safe to put extra nails in and re-fix
- Use a hammer and punch to make sure all other nails are at least a millimetre or two beneath the surface
- (Do I need to fill the little holes with filler at this stage?)

Sanding
- Use the floor sander to take all flooring back to pine
- Use edge sander to get right up to skirting boards and around fireplaces.
- (Do I need to mix the sawdust with wood glue and spread out over the whole floor? - something I saw on YouTube)
- Go over the whole floor with a much finer grade sandpaper (possibly by hand?)
- Hoover and then mop to get all dust off

Finishing
- Use a wide paint brush to apply a coat of solvent base medium oak wood stain to the whole floor & leave for 24 hours to dry
- Go over the whole floor with a much finer grade sandpaper (possibly by hand?)
- Use a wide paint brush to apply a second coat of solvent base medium oak wood stain to the whole floor & leave for 24 hours to dry
- Go over the whole floor with a much finer grade sandpaper (possibly by hand?)
- Use a wide brush to apply a coat of clear wax or clear varnish to the entire floor
- Leave for 48 hours before moving furniture back in.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be most welcome. My nearest store for supplies is Wickes so I'll probably be using their own brand stuff.

Cheers,
Ross

[redsturgeon]

Wow Ross, you really sound like a perfectionist, if you follow all those steps then I'm sure your floor will end up looking great. I've sanded a few pine floors in my time and much depends on the condition of the floors and the look you want but IMHO sanded floors look best if they are not done too perfectly and then they can get even better as they age gracefully. So the look is not really like a squash court or the like but more old country pub patina.

All I did was sand down my floors using the machines hired (after knocking nails down, then patching any major holes. Stain as you wish then add the top coat. I used a product called Osmo Oil which is great stuff. I have to admit I did not bother about all that sanding between coats and definitely did not, "mix the sawdust with wood glue and spread out over the whole floor". Nor do you really need to fill in each nail hole the Osmo oil will take care of that.

Good luck.

John

[saechunu]

Personally I'd be quite wary of using a coloured stain; the colouring is often too uniform compared to the complex array of shades you get in naturally darker timber. The resulting look can often be quite false looking and rather iffy in my opinion.

John's suggestion of Osmo Polyx Oil is an excellent one. It's fabulous stuff that easy to put on and look after, looks great, and stays looking great. You don't need to go too crazy sanding the floor too smoothly. I put the Osmo on using a sponge, ensuring no excess. You don't need to sand it between coats, but I give it a quick rub with a Scotchbrite-type pad to remove any slight 'snots' or whatever your local slang for them is, as you do get a better finish. Also, I do 3 coats not 2, for a richer finish.

I would definitely go to the trouble of filling holes first, else they become a dirt trap and the edges can get caught and splinter off. I've used various coloured wood fillers, mixing them a bit to avoid an obvious colour. It can initially look a bit odd when doing it, but after sanding and a few coats of Osmo have gone on they're indistinguishable from regular knots.

NB Osmo Top Oil is great on furniture or worktops too. I'll probably be trying Osmo Exterior shortly also.

[midnightcatprowl]

Another vote for Osmo Oil. I once took on the lease of a shop premises which had a wooden floor in a dire condition. We sanded it - not paying too much attention to detail - and then after removing all the debris applied Osmo Oil. Results were amazing and it is the easiest possible surface to maintain even in a high traffic situation. Customers constantly admired our beautiful floor even though in reality it was just rather rough old planking of the most basic sort.

The other advantage of course is that Osmo Oil is environmentally friendly and will not fill your home with ghastly fumes.

[poundcoin]

The floor may have yellowed as it was probably treated with oil based polyurethane .
After sanding depends if you want a natural light finish or a darker stained finish .
Never heard of Osmo before this thread but looks expensive .
Do you have a Screwfix depot near ? I bought their No Nonsense Trade Floor Varnish for my parquet kitchen floor and it's been fine . £21 for 2.5 litres !
Look at the reviews
http://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsense-q ... 0wodM4IKTQ

[sg31]

The floor may have yellowed as it was probably treated with oil based polyurethane .
After sanding depends if you want a natural light finish or a darker stained finish .
Never heard of Osmo before this thread but looks expensive .
Do you have a Screwfix depot near ? I bought their No Nonsense Trade Floor Varnish for my parquet kitchen floor and it's been fine . £21 for 2.5 litres !
Look at the reviews
http://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsense-q ... 0wodM4IKTQ

Trust me Osmo is worth every penny. As a builder I've used most finishes over the last 30 years, if I was doing the job for someone I would strongly recommend Osmo. If I was doing the job on my own place I wouldn't bother with anything else.

It is surprising how far the oil goes, you use much less than with any varnish. Tough as nails too. It seems like a lot of money but it isn't worth spoiling the job by saving a few pounds on the finish. Think of the cost of hire of equipment, abrasives and the time and effort involved. The extra money on Osmo doesn't seem quite as much in that context.

(No connection with Osmo, just a happy customer).

[poundcoin]

Trust me Osmo is worth every penny. As a builder I've used most finishes over the last 30 years, if I was doing the job for someone I would strongly recommend Osmo.
....it is surprising how far the oil goes, you use much less than with any varnish. Tough as nails too.

Hi praise , I must try it out on something .
'Spect I will see it everywhere I go now .

[sg31]

Trust me Osmo is worth every penny. As a builder I've used most finishes over the last 30 years, if I was doing the job for someone I would strongly recommend Osmo.
....it is surprising how far the oil goes, you use much less than with any varnish. Tough as nails too.

Hi praise , I must try it out on something .
'Spect I will see it everywhere I go now .

I've used it on oak furniture with great success and their door oil is very good on wood internal doors.

[RossP]

Thanks to everyone for their input - I will definitely be checking out Osmo oil in the future but had already bought some varnish before reading the replies!

By way of an update, the process went pretty smoothly (pun intended) up to and including the staining stage. I used a solvent based Wickes "interior and exterior mid oak" wood stain which didn't explicitly say it was for floors but did say it was suited to heavy traffic areas. I used a brush to apply it which worked fairly well although it was a challenge to not create brush marks at the end of the stroke. The can said to let it dry for 16-24 hours, so when I returned the next day, the colour looked good and I decided to skip a second coat (for fear that it would make it too dark) and went to buy a clear satin varnish/oil to go over the top. There wasn't much choice in Wickes and the staff in there are next to useless in terms of giving advice (how I long for Bunnings in Oz where all the staff are able and interested to help with DIY dilemmas) so I went to B&Q instead which although more expensive have much more choice and helpful staff.

I bought a clear satin varnish (they didn't have a wax) which came with a pad application which I hoped would save time. It went on well enough but when I came back the following day there was a milky white residue over half the floor! I thought a light sanding would sort it out but nope, its still there. What is odd was that when you wipe it with a damp cloth it disappears but then reappears when the floor dries.

My first thought was that the solvent based stain hadn't played nicely with the water based varnish and that I was going to have to re sand everything But a little online searching led me to believe that the white stuff was similar to something called "blushing" and was a result of moisture being trapped in the varnish (i.e. I hadn't let the stain dry completely). There were a few suggestions online on how to rectify blushing so I created a few test areas to try them all; rubbing with white spirit, re-varnish over the top, smear petroleum jelly (i.e. Vaseline) on the wood. The result?! - the Vaseline worked a treat! The theory is that it effectively attracts the moisture out of the varnish, thereby removing the milky white effect.

Luckily I decided just to do the one room initially so I won't have to buy too much Vaseline and will make sure I let the rest of downstairs completely dry before varnishing!

[Loir]

Thanks for the suggestion of Vaseline.

I managed to spill hot tea on a dark stained chest that my wife is rather fond and it left white marks as you describe. No polishing seemed to help

I knew it was trapped moisture so I tried a method I have used before which is a dry towel on the stain then running over that with a hot iron (no steam obviously!). I worked quite well but there were still some whitish patches.

Vaseline seems to have fixed those too!

Loir