How To Restain Hardwood Floors
One of the best things about hardwood floors is that you can refinish them over the years. This gives you the opportunity to apply a new stain color and change the color scheme of your room. This is great if you are the type person who is always changing the decor inside your home. Applying wood stain to large floor areas is actually not as difficult as you might think. This article explains the the major steps in the process, so you can decide if it is the right DIY project for you.
Preparing and Sanding the Floor
One of the most difficult parts of the job is simply moving everything out of the room. It's easier to do the entire room at once, so avoid pushing everything into one corner and staining half of the room at a time. Once everything is removed from the room, you need to do some masking. Tape off all of the baseboards to protect them from the stain.
You will probably need a vibrating sander with extra fine sandpaper to smooth out any rough spots in your floor. You don't need to sand off the existing stain, but you want to make the floor surface as evenly smooth as possible. Then, you will need to thoroughly vacuum the floor to remove all of the sawdust before you start to stain it.
Staining your Floor
Staining your floor is messy work, but it is pretty straightforward. You'll get the best results if you use a few lint-free rags to spread the stain. You can basically pour the stain directly onto the floor and then spread it around with the rags. Start in one corner and work your way across the room. You obviously want to avoid walking over the wet stain. You should keep several more rags on hand to wipe away the excess stain and prevent puddling. For added strength and waterproofing, you will want to apply multiple coats of stain. You need to wait for the first coat to completely dry and then smooth it out with steel wool before applying the next coat. The steel wool will smooth out any chunks in the stain and ensure that the next coat has a smooth surface to stick to. However, you need to vacuum out the fine dust that will be left behind after using the steel wool.
You will also want to use steel wool and vacuum after your final coat to leave your floor perfect before you move everything back into the room.
For professional help treating your hardwood floor, visit websites like http://idahohardwoodflooring.com.
