What Are the Most Common Hardwood Floor Sanding Mistakes?
Using the wrong grit of sandpaper
When it comes to hardwood floor sanding, by far the biggest mistake we, at Absolutely Hardwood Flooring, see is homeowners not using the right grit of sandpaper. We can not stress enough the importance of using this, and you will not be doing yourself any favors when you start to sand your hardwood floors using a sandpaper which is too fine. What grit you begin sanding with will greatly depend on what state your floorboards are in. If they have already been sanded before and only need a refresh, then you may be able to start sanding using finer paper, however, with most cases, you will need to begin with a much more coarse paper than you would expect.
When it is the first time your floors have been sanded, then the maximum grit sandpaper you need to start with is 24 grit. Even though this sounds excessive, but, anything finer will not be enough to sand off all the old dirt and varnish. And, more importantly, it gives you much more work not to mention cost, due to the fact you will need to use more sandpaper than when you were using the right grit.
Insufficient sanding
Sadly, there is no getting around it, when it comes to hardwood floor sanding, you will need to be prepared for hard work. When you first begin to sand you should instantly notice a big difference in your floor, however, once you have taken off most of the varnish and dirt, that is when the progress will slow down.
This is because of the floorboards not being completely flat, which means the drum of the floor sanding machine is unable to reach every area of the floorboards in one go. Which unfortunately does mean you will often see shadows either at the edges of your floorboards, when they are concave or in the middle of them when they are convex.
If reading our blog has discouraged the DIY route, and you prefer to call us in, then please give us a call at (407) 883-4046 today, we are based in the Orlando, FL area.