If your hardwood floors are scratched or showing their age, you can restore them by having them refinished. Refinished floors look good as new since the surface of the floor is removed and new stains and coats are applied. However, you might balk at having your floors refinished because of all the problems that the dust from sanding can cause, including the need to leave your home for a few days. The solution is to hire a contractor that uses a dustless wood floor refinishing technique. Here's how it works.
Dustless Refinishing Involves Sanding Your Floor
Dustless refinishing shouldn't be confused with sandless refinishing. Sandless refinishing doesn't involve sanding off the top layer of flooring, and it's not a good match for a floor that has scratches or when you want to change the stain color. Instead, you want dustless refinishing that works in the same way as traditional wood floor refinishing that sands the top layer of the floor away. The only difference is that equipment contains the dust created so it doesn't affect your home.
In order to reach the bare wood of your floors, it's usually necessary to sand the floors a few times using finer grit each time to remove every bit of stain and imperfections. The goal is to get down to bare wood so the flooring can be restored completely, and this process creates a lot of dust that the dustless system handles well.
The Dust Is Sucked Into A Containment System
The traditional method of floor sanding releases a large quantity of dust in your home. This is contained somewhat by putting plastic sheeting in doorways, but you'll still have to contend with dust suspended in the air for some time after the work is done. The dustless system removes dust so well that it's not necessary to hang plastic barriers around your house, and you may not even need to move out while the work is ongoing. However, it's important to know that the dustless method does create a minimal amount of dust, so if you have asthma or COPD, talk to your doctor and contractor about whether it's safe to stay in your home.
The dust is contained during this process with a vacuum. The vacuum attaches to the floor sander and pulls the dust into a container outdoors or on the truck so all the dust stays confined rather than being released into the air.
Dustless Sanding Might Provide Superior Results
The frustrating thing about dust from sanding is that it's so hard to clean up. It's essential that all dust is removed before the stain and coating are applied to your floors or imperfections will show. Since the dustless method removes dust, there isn't a layer of dust to clean up afterward that could affect the quality of the refinishing job.