Hi, I bought my house which was built in 68 this passed april and I'm just getting around to tearing up the nasty old carpet to reveal the hardwoods. From a wood standpoint, the floors are in much better condition than I expected - terrific in fact. The finish? Well, I'm not sure. See I don't really know exactly what I'm looking for. It APPEARS to me as if there is a tiny bit of finish left on the floors. But I'm not really sure how to tell how much or how worn. I am looking to figure out what the mininum I would need to do to enjoy these floors, I'd prefer to recoat rather than resurface if I can. Can anyone tell from these pictures?


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y153/J187/P3300046.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y153/J187/floor2.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y153/J187/floor1.jpg

Your photos were not very clear, somewhat blurry (and no, it isn't my vision ) But from what I can tell, the floors appear to be in ok condition. More than likely, you will not be able to tell exactly what kind of finish is on them. Could be a natural or synthetic varnish, lacquer, shellac, wax, an early polyurethane, or a combination. If you do not want to have them resanded and refinished, the safest thing to do is to wax them with a high quality floor wax. I like Trewax. If you attempt to screen and recoat with a urethane finish, you risk having that finish peel off from contaminents or wax that may be present that you are unaware of. As I pro, I would not agree to recoat. I would only resand and refinish or clean and wax.

Thank you Gary. I appreciate your response and your honesty. One more question. If I chose to simply try to recoat, and lets say worst case scenario the finish flakes off, what would be the drawback of then resanding the whole floor and starting over. In other words, am I risking anything more than the time and money I'd spend on recoating? If not, it may be worth a shot for me, this is my first home and I've spend almost all of the money I can on renovations - it would be very helpful to get the floors done for just the cost of some urethane and sand paper then to either pay a pro to resurface or taking my chances using a drum sander for the first time. BTW, I have access to a free floor buffer that I could use to sand for the recoating, but not if I had to resurface. Thanks again..

Quite simply, the answer is no. THe finish would easily chip, scar and peel off but you haven't done any harm that could not be repaired by sanding.

Excellent. Thanks. You've been a big help. First straight answers I've had in a while.

I agree with gary to a point Our floors looked like that too but we had stains and nail holes and seperation in a few boards we resanded it all off used 80 grit all the way to the bare wood our floors were oak too like yours and it looks like your floors were stained with the same stain as ours were and we wanted to keep it that way so we bought a stain from home depot called minwax wood finish penetrates,stains and seals the color was colonial maple. we applyed that after we did our sanding and wood filler our floors turned out great. but if you havent got any holes or gaps they guy at home depot told us we could simply sand with a 120 grit paper the whole floor and apply a polyurthane to bring back the shine.

I didn't see where we were at odds in our answers. The poster was talking about two different forms of repairs. One being resanding/refinishing and the other being recoating. I recommended not attempting to recoat an old floor that has an unknown history and an unknown finish. One CANNOT successfully apply a polyurethane finish over wax, stearates, certain oils, polishes and a myriad of other substances. Therefore, the safest route to take is to remove all the existing finish down to the bare wood. That is what you did, little blue eyes. And that is termed a refinish, not a recoat. And how long has that guy at Home Depot been a licensed flooring contractor specializing in hardwood flooring? I would not trust any info from Home Depot employees without thoroughly checking it out from another trusted source.