luvnpeas

I'd like to protect my floors without reducing their life. They are scratched and worn, with some bare wood patches in a few places. What happens if I just clean, lightly sand rough patches (by hand), and apply finish? Would it be better to paint them?

They're probably about 80 years old, and don't have many complete re-finishes left in them.

oldognewtrick

If you have some spots that are through the finish into the wood, I'd suggest thourghly clean the floor, get some stain the color of the floor, lightly sand the area, apply the stain, then apply finish. It won't match perfect, but the only way to do that will require a total sanding and refinish of the floor. I wouldn't paint, if you ever want to refinish to natural wood tones it will make the job harder to do.

Just my

nealtw

You do want to test to see what the original finnish was, varnish, oil or wax. Not likely going to be a nice easy water base.

kattey

One thing that adds beauty in our house is being +shiny, vibrant hardwood flooring. Dull looking, scratched and worn floors can detract the beauty of any decor. Many of us tend to avoid refinishing their hardwood floors because of the mess that comes with sanding, well sanding isn't the only way to restore the beauty of hardwood floors. You may try screening.
Screening is a method used by professional hardwood floor refinishers. In screening, a special pad which scuffs the floor is used on a low speed buffer. This scuffing process will remove the small scratches in the polyurethane coat that make the floor appear dull. The scuffing produces a small amount of dust that can then be vacuumed away. After any last dust is cleaned with a rag, a new polyurethane coat is applied.

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