How to Refinish Hardwood Floors With Sanding and Sealers
- 1). Clean the hardwood floor and prepare it for refinishing. Begin by moving the furniture from the room and then sweep the floor with a broom to remove large debris. Use a damp cloth or a wet dust mop like a Swiffer brand wet mop to wipe up small particles of debris and dust off of the floor.
- 2). Ensure that nail heads and screws heads, if present in the floor, are sunk below the surface so that you will not hit them when you sand to remove the top layer of the wood. Set nails with a nail set and hammer or countersink screws with a screwdriver.
- 3). Sand off the top layer of the hardwood floor with an orbital sander; move the orbital sander around the room and sand to eliminate the appearance of the deepest scratches. Do not just sand over scratches, as this will make the floor look patchy; instead sand over the entire surface of the floor so that the floor does not look patchy once you are finished sanding.
- 4). Sweep and and use a damp mop again to remove as much of the dust from the floor as you can. You will have created a lot of dust from sanding the top layer of the floor, so sweep and dust-mop the floor a couple of times before proceeding to the next step.
- 5). Paint on a new coating of polyurethane as a seal for the floor. Paint on one coating and allow the floor to dry overnight before applying a second coat. Allow overnight drying again before returning furniture to the floor and walking across the floor. To promote drying, open windows and ventilate the room.
