Hello and thanks in advance for any feedback. I recently had floors in my 60-year-old apartment refinished. My first mistake: I hired a guy without checking his references. He used 80-grit paper on the first sanding, then did two coats of Minwax Fast-Drying oil-based poly. He didn't sand with a finer grit between coats (as I learned later).

When I returned, I found the floors REALLY rough, so I called him. He said he'd sand again with a finer grit and that was all it needed. I insisted he do the fine-grit sanding and then another coat of poly, which he did. But when I returned after that, the floors were still rough -- better, but rough, and with a baby on the way, I need smooth floors that won't hurt his little knees when he starts crawling.

I gave up on the first guy (Ryan) and asked my ex-boyfriend to take a look. He's a DIY renovator and has done a bunch of floors but not a ton. He came in, pole-sanded with 220-grit and and then laid a thick coat of Minwax High-Build poly. He said Ryan's mistake -- along with a really bad initial sanding job that left divots and uneven floors -- was that his coats were too thin.

I returned to the apartment yesterday and found the floors basically smooth and glassy, as I'd wanted, but with a lot of bubbles and a bunch of nubbies of dried poly. I'm not going to redo the floors -- they're basically good enough for now. But I'd like to get rid of the bubbles and nubbies. My ex suggested I use very very fine steel wool or a white (fine) Scotchbrite pad to sand them down. He said this shouldn't hurt the gloss.

Any thoughts on getting rid of the bubbles and nubbies? Will my ex's plan work? Thanks so much for any help you can offer!

All hand crafted floors are not going to be like a furniture table top finish, or even a prefinish floor.

If it has visible bubbles, the finish is going to wear off fast with foot traffic.
Causes:
1.) Contaminates not removed before coating(will peel off later)
2.) Applying a hot finish on a cold floor
3.) Applying a cool finish to a hot area of the floor(sunlight through windows heating areas of flooring)
4.) Overworking the finish during application
5.) Air movement across the floor, drying the finish before the bubbles can flow out
6.) Floor not screened or sufficiently cleaned between coats of finish
7.) Shaking or mixing finish, to fast, inducing air bubbles.

Cratering, is often mistaken for bubbles. Looks like the crater on the moon.
Cause:
1.) Contamination of the finish
2.) application of finish, over previous coats of finish, that have not dried and are still off-gassing.


Tacking the floor several times before each coat, to get as much debris as humanly and site conditions allow. Tacking just once, doesn't get it.


If you mess with it, it is going to create a dull spot, that will need a coat of finish to match back up.

Dear Floorguy,

Sorry for my late reply on this. Thank you for your insight into my floor problem. The windows in the rooms were left open during drying (to get rid of fumes), and I think that may have caused the bubbles, as the top of the finish might've dried before the bubbles had a chance to pop on their own.

I did use fine steel wool to sand them down and, like you said, it took some of the finish off. But at least it achieved my goal of smoother floors. At this point, I realize they're too messed up to be like what I wanted/expected. I'll probably wait another 20 years, or until I sell the apartment, and then do all the floors again. Next time I'll hire pros and hopefully they can even out the wood and fix the mistakes my first guy created (he hasn't returned my calls or texts - very unprofessional).

Thanks again, Floorguy. If you lived in New York City, I'd hire you to do the floors right.