How To Refinish Hardwood Floors Without Sanding

It wouldn’t be surprising if the thought of sanding the hardwood floors of your house make you cringe. Sanding leaves your house dusty and may take away the character of your hardwood flooring. It is also an expensive method that may leave a large hole on your pocket.

    You don’t have to sand your hardwood floors to restore them to their original state. You can bring back the warmth and shine of your hardwood flooring by gently buffing it and coating it with polyurethane resin. Given below is the step-by-step procedure:
    Gathering the materials. You need wood filler, fine grade sandpaper, a scraper, a hammer, a polyurethane finish, mineral spirits, a buffing machine, a squeegee sponge mop, and a cotton cloth rag for this activity. If you can’t find a wood color that matches the color of your hardwood flooring, purchase Elmer’s stainable wood filler. This wood filler is uncolored so you can color it with a stain pen that matches the color of your hardwood flooring.
    Prepare your hardwood floors. Remove all the pieces of furniture and the carpet from the room that you’re going to refinish. Inspect the hardwood flooring for any exposed nails or tacking strips. Hammer down the exposed nails you have found and remove the tacking strips with a scraper. Also, look at your hardwood flooring for gaps. Fill in these gaps with wood filler.

    Buff your hardwood floors. Use a buffing machine to lightly scrape the top layer of your hardwood flooring. Work the buffing machine around the whole area of the room. Use a fine grade sandpaper to scour areas that the buffing machine cannot reach. When you’re done buffing your hardwood flooring, moisten a cotton cloth rag with mineral spirits and use it to wipe your hardwood flooring. This procedure will get your hardwood flooring ready for resin application.
    Apply polyurethane resin on your hardwood floors. Put a layer of polyurethane resin on your hardwood flooring using a squeegee sponge mop. Let the resin cure for about twelve hours before walking on the hardwood flooring and putting back the carpet and the furniture.
    If you’re only refinishing hardwood flooring on a small area, you can use a chemical sanding system instead of buffing and coating the area with polyurethane. This method is more convenient as it lets you refinish your hardwood flooring without wiping away wood shavings. You only have to make sure that the room you’re working on is well ventilated to prevent you from inhaling the chemicals of the sanding system.


Do you want to darken the tint of your hardwood flooring? No problem! You can deepen the color of your hardwood floors without refinishing them. Put a pigment of your desired color on a clear urethane and use it to coat your hardwood flooring. It is up to you whether you’d use an oil-based urethane or a water-based one. Just make sure that the tint that you’re going to mix with the urethane is compatible with the urethane. Ask the hardware personnel for information on this. When you’re done applying the colored urethane on your flooring, let it dry and apply a second coat of untainted urethane finish on top of the colored urethane to protect your flooring.