Anyone ever buff on/off stain? Saw it done for the first time today. Saved lots of material and labor.

Been buffing off stain for 25 years. Have not applied it with a buffer because it is just too messy. My system is apply a THIN even coat of stain using a painting pad (Padco). Then walk across the floor and wipe the edges only. After that, use the buffer to buff off the rest of the stain utilizing old terry towels or rags. It does save time, energy. Not sure about using less material. Stain is cheap; $20.00 a gal and does 600 ft.

I've often wondered if that works... Does it come out pretty even? ... some guys steel wool stain before 1st coat of poly (NOT waterborne) do you? Any benefit to that? Will lambswool stain faster than padco? Have I asked enough questions???? I GOTTA KNOW! PLEEEEEEZ TELL ME!!

Willian, It works great. Better than hand wiping because you can see the overall appearance of the stain job better from a standing position. Lets be specific. I buff twice. Once to remove most of the stain and a second time to make sure there is no residue and remove the rest of the stain. When using the nylon bristle driver, I'll use two or three towel/rags so as to not damage the floor with the driver block and when one towel/rag gets soaked, I turn over the three towel bundle to a fresh towel. One needs to select their stain well. Using a very fast drying stain will not give you enough time to buff well. Of course I like DuraSeal, but Olympic makes some nice interior stains that are inexpensive, dry and work well, and don't bleed back. Some Minwax stains bleed back because they are so thin. The idea is to apply a THIN, EVEN coat of stain. Flooding the floor may cause bleed back and delay dry times. That's why I don't use a lamby. If you can without flooding the floor, getting stain all over the base and casings, then go for it. For me, Padco works good cause I use it for the field and cuttin in. No need to keep switching. Now using the buffer will remove more stain than hand wiping and you don't have the color control you would have when wiping by hand. But for me. on a large job (2000 sqft), I'd rather buff the stain off than rub the whole floor on my hands and knees. Give it a try on your next small job. P.S. I don't "burnish the floors with steel wool or burlap before the first coat. I did it for awhile when I first started finishing but saw it was a waste of time. I'm always looking for ways to reduce the time it takes to sand n" finish and still produce a nice floor

thank you, Gary.
I kow what you mean by flow control with a lamby. We hand brush EVERYTHING with 12" brushes. Black bristle for oil modified and dense white (snowplow method) for acid cure (even though I hate the stuff and usually talk folks out of it) and good ol padco for water borne (mostly Trek Plus).

Have you ever used the "Shure-line" pad applicators at Lowe's/Depot? I was in a pinch recently and picked one up a while back thinking it wouldn't be as good as cheap as it was but was very surprised to find I liked it.
They didn't have a 9 in. but the 7 did ok for the small kitchen we were in. I realy liked the one specifically for decks and fences. It was the cheaper of the two and was contoured on both sides which realy turned out to be a neat feature for feathering in and out of wet lines without bubbles or stop/start marks. (make any sense?) Of course they don't make a 'T'-bar but I'm all thumbs with them darn things anyway.(don't tell anyone )

Anyway... I know what you mean about stain and dry time too, and agree totally. I'm not a Dura Seal guy for fineshes anymore (Absolute coatings is fantastic) but I think d/s stain is great. If you like the color line Minwax offers but hate how wishy washy it is(like I do as well) then try Absolute's Last-N-Last stains. Same colors and names from Minwax line but WAY better Stain. Even comes with added conditioner to help with softwoods.

In buffing twice, Is that back-to-back or once to wipe off then once the next day after thoroughly dry?
Does it help to even out the color to buff once against the grain then again with the grain etc.?
Sorry to sound so green but for as much flooring we do we hardly ever touch stain except on hand distressed floors.
Hey, thanks again. I've been looking for an excuse to try a buffer 'toweling off' stain if for any reason to be up off the knees for one more procedure.... (If you don't have 'em yet YES!!! Pro Knees ARE worth the $'s www.proknee.com )

Hey William,
When I buff the stain off, I do it "back to back". If you try it you'll see that the rags get loaded pretty quick and then just start to smear the stain around. So I use the rags to get as much excess of the floor and to use the least amount of towel/rags as possible. Then I'll buff again with fresh towels to even the stain out and remove all the excess from the surface.
I think I tried one of those Shure Lines once or twice, only when I didn't have a Padco. Their ok. Like Padco better. It what you get used to I suppose. I don't think the buffing technique would work on scraped floors. You need to have a regular sanded floor. I have known guys who brush all their finishes with a 6" floor brush. At least your using a 12"er. At 54 yrs. old, anything I can do standing up I'm in favor of. So for small and medium jobs, It's a Padco pad on a broom stick. Large jobs get T-bared. which isn't as neat but gets the finish down faster. If my local distributors carried Absolute Coatings, I would be using their stuff, I'm sure. As it is, I'd have to have it shipped from Floor Style and really don't want to deal with that. I like going to my distributors and catching up with everyone so I just buy what they have to sell. Their sorta like family after all these years. Dura Seal pissed me off years ago when they changed the formula of their stain then denied it for two years before finally admitting that it had been changed. So I don't use Dura Seal unless someone asks me to. I use Either Woodline OMU or Basic Coating's OMU for oil and either Bona or Basic Coating's Street Shoe for water based. But I am thinking about trying Poloplaz cause I heard some good things about it and it is almost 50% less than Traffic. Also Vermeister. Who comes up with these names anyway? They sound like beer makers. Yeah, I've tried all sorts of knee pads over the years. I still like my leathers. Like I said, I try to find as many ways possible to avoid getting down on these knobby knees.

Thanks Gary. Now I can't wait to stain one!

Take Care,
Will