Floor Sanding - Festool??

[Jon McElwain]

So my rental needs the floors sanded ASAP and I can't find anyone to do the work in time. I've only got maybe 300-350 s.f. in the kitchen and a hallway, so I think I'll try it myself. I can rent a drum sander for getting the finish off, and will probably use a random orbit floor sander to get the scratches out. Since I'll be saving a bunch of money by doing it myself, I'm thinking of getting a Festool Sander for the edges. I've got a Rotex RO 150 that would probably work, but I'm thinking of getting either an RS 2, or a LS 130 Linear Sander as I would like one of these for future projects.

The RS 2 looks like it would be a little better for the project at hand, but the LS 130 has the benefit of being able to finish handrails and spindles - which is a project that I need to tackle next.

My questions are:

• Am I crazy to do it myself?
• Which Festool sander would you recommend for my needs?
• What floor finish would you recommend? I am refinishing oak floors with what I assume is an oil based urethane finish (just a guess). The floor is about 10 years old and I don't think it has ever been refinished. Can I put a water-based poly on after I sand most of the old finish off? Will I get blotchy results if I don't get every speck of finish off?
• Anything else I need to know?

I've got about a week to complete before renters take occupancy, so I need to get in and get done asap to let the finish cure.

Thanks in advanced for your help!

[peter gagliardi]

I have done several floors with only my Rotex 150. Comes out better than a pro job due to the random orbit. When in non aggressive mode, you can get right up against most things, except corners, and what you can't can be handled quicker and better with an old fashioned handled scraper.
Linear motion sanders of that type work, but are slooooow.

[Jim Becker]

I did one approximately 12' x 12' room using my Rotex 150 and ETS 150/3 because it was small enough not to justify the rental of a larger floor sander and such floor sanders used on wide pine without good experience can result in a disaster. It was a lot of work (and hard on the body) and took a lot of time to work through the abrasives, but the tools did an outstanding job.

[Paul F Franklin]

Be careful with the drum sander. *Very* easy to end up with dips and waves if you haven't used one before. You have to have it moving (the whole sander) when you touch the drum down, and can't let it stop moving for even a second or you will gouge the floor. It takes some time to get used to the rhythm of starting the motion, lowering the drum, lifting the drum, and stopping the motion.

A lot of rental places also rent oscillating pad sanders that use a giant sheet of abrasive; they are much more forgiving than the drums, although they are not as fast (which is why they are more forgiving).

[Jim Andrew]

I rented a large random orbit sander from Menards to sand my shop floor. Get plenty of 36 grit pads, as I only got 2 sets for my 1200 sf shop floor. Should have gotten ALL 36 grit, but used 50 and 80 as well. When you are sanding a floor that just needs the finish removed, and has been sanded before, the huge ROS sander works great.

[Davis Young]

You're probably crazy for doing it since I have done it several times before and my mental fitness has been questioned from time to time. I've done entire rooms with just a Porter Cable 4x24 belt sander and a Festool Rotex 150 for the edges. For what you're describing, the Rotex will work just fine. The perfect paper was Cristal but sadly they're discontinued. You could try Saphir or Granat or even Brilliant if the finish is not too heavy. Basically, you want to start with the finest grit that will immediately remove the finish and then go finer in grit until the one recommended by the finish manufacturer. For example, start with 60-grit. If the finish is removed quickly, and I mean about a square foot in 2-3 seconds, then you are good to go. If it takes longer, like from hitting the same spot several times to remove the finish, then go to a coarser grit like 40 and repeat the test. After removing the finish, subsequent grits will go faster as you're just removing the previous sanding marks. I've sanded to anywhere between 80-120 grit.

Once you sand down to bare wood and remove the dust, you will want to immediately apply a sealer. This will prevent the wood from absorbing moisture. I have used water- and solvent-based conditioner, but my best result is shellac-based from Zinsser Seal Coat. The finish I have used is from Home Depot, Pro Finisher by Parks oil based floor finish, mainly because of availability. It works fine. Your time constraint might necessitate water-based, but the general idea is oil-based=longer drying time (I can maybe get first two coats first day and one coat each subsequent day), more yellowing, and more durable while water-based=shorter drying time, less yellowing, not as durable, and possibly grain raising.

For both sealer and finish I use the 10" lambskin pad on wooden block. It holds a lot of finish so less dipping. Speaking of dipping, get yourself a couple of those disposable aluminum roasting pans, the kind for turkeys. They hold a good amount of finish, you can use your pad on a pole to move it around, and the bottom won't scratch the floor as you move it around.

[roger wiegand]

In my experience directly comparing oil and water-based urethanes side-by-side on floors I found that there was no contest in durability. In a high traffic area oil urethane was worn out down to bare wood in under three years, while the water-based product still looked pretty much like new most of a decade later.

I'd strongly recommend against using consumer marketed products on any floor; I've never seen them hold up for any period of time. I've had very good success with the Bona line. I like their AmberSeal product to give a little more look of an oil product and to help pop figure (I tend towards birdseye maple flooring) as a seal coat, and then the Traffic or TrafficHD catalyzed urethanes as a topcoat. I'm sure there are others that are as good. I used the TrafficHD in my shop and it doesn't scratch even when dragging big machines across the floor.

[Rich Engelhardt]

In my experience directly comparing oil and water-based urethanes side-by-side on floors I found that there was no contest in durability. In a high traffic area oil urethane was worn out down to bare wood in under three years, while the water-based product still looked pretty much like new most of a decade later.

That's my exact experience also.
The oil based Varathane I put on in 2012 is showing extreme wear.
The WB poly I used in 2006, looks like it's just been applied.

[Jon McElwain]

Thanks all for the replies and advice. I ended up doing a bit of a hybrid. I rented the drum sander for the heavy lifting and was able to sand my entire floor in an evening. The next evening was spent with the rotex 150 and a pack of 40 grit pads for the edges.

My "labor charge" to myself was an RO 90. It did a great job in some areas like corners and a couple of tight areas around the water line behind the fridge etc. But nothing did the edges nearly as tight as the Fein Mulitimaster with the triangle sanding adapter. I fit the sander with a flat edge at the front of the tool (rather than a point at the front) and was able to go around the edges in short order.

Tonight I'll rent a disk floor sander to get the waves from the drum out. I did pretty good, but I know that if I can detect even a slight wave on the bare wood, it will be magnified when the finish goes down. Anyway, I'll disk sand up to 120 grit or so and start sealing and finishing tomorrow. Seal with the Zinzer, then apply as many coats of water based finish as I can over the weekend. Ready for business end of Monday. Nice to practice on a rental!!



Tools (minus the rented drum sander). RO 90, Fein Multimaster, Rotex 150:
imgress.jpg imgres.jpg 571592_xl.jpg




After first evening - drum sanding:
20161012_215244.jpg 20161012_215233.jpg 20161012_234843.jpg 20161012_234814.jpg

[Jon McElwain]

Some more photos after edge sanding:

20161013_235933.jpg 20161013_235939.jpg 20161013_235955.jpg 20161014_000001.jpg

Still needs a lot of work to get it flat, but the major work is done. I'll post a few more after the final sand and finish.

[Bill Sutherland]

I did about the same size and ended up using Penofin Verde. No fumes and went on beautifully and has lasted 2 years without any problems and it is in a high traffic kitchen. There are absolutely no signs of wear and it was on Oak flooring. Has had water spills and other mishaps without any staining or problems. Penofin is great indoors but is not very good on decks.

[Peter Kelly]

Street Shoe Hydroline Sealer followed by 120 grit "fine" sanding, then 2 coats of Street Shoe 275. Stuff dries insanely fast so you'll be done finishing in a day.

http://www.basiccoatings.com

Used it on the floors of the upstate house just recently.

[Jason Roehl]

Jon, in the 4th picture of your last post (#10), I can see a band around the edge where the small sander marks overlap the marks of the drum sander. You'll want to get rid of that--it will show under a WB finish.

Pros use a floor buffer with a sanding screen on it after edging to put down even sanding swirls over the whole floor--it gets rid of that edging band. One of the large RO machines rented from a big box store would also do the trick--you'd want to use 80-120 grit (if 80 is necessary, then go over it with 120, otherwise, just 100 grit may be sufficient).