Sanding Oak Floors Grit

The first edging grit should be the same as the first belt sanding grit so in this case 60g.
Sanding oak floors grit. My secret for smooth staining. It would be a total waste of time and effort to begin with 80 grit on the pre sanded veneered wood and you would risk sanding through. This type of sanding will level minor unevenness left by the drum sander and edger as well as buff away sanding scratches. Next you would use a grade 80 screen backed by a red pad then a grade 100 screen with a white driving pad.
Scrape or sand all corners and around radiator feet or pipes. Sand the floor with 80g on the belt sander and use the dust in the bag to do any filling you may need. Start with 36 grit sandpaper for a floor that hasn t been sanded in a long time or that has a lot of heavy finish on it. You typically would follow that by hardplating with 100 grit abrasive paper.
Use a radiator edger to sand under all radiators or toe kicks if you have them. Generally speaking for woods like oak and pine i don t like to go any finer than 120 grit or any rougher than 100 grit. Then clean the corners of with 60g either by hand palm sander or even delta sander if you have one. You will remove a lot of wood stock even when sanding the hardest of wood floor species.
To begin the process you should start with the coarse grit of around 30 to 40 grit as the coarse grit is going to help get up the initial layer of the floor to help give you the best results. If the hardwood floor can handle another sanding plan to be aggressive about it. Use as the starting grit for floors with shellac finishes single layers of paint or some very hard floors like maple. Stay close to that range and the wood should look great.
Sanding with an orbital sander is a three step process and it will take three separate sanding sessions to get the floor you want. Repeat steps 4 through 6 until you have sanded the entire floor through 80 grit or 100 grit for maple floors or oak floors that will be stained. Back to our floor. You can finish sand both of these surfaces with 180 grit for example but you might begin with 80 grit on the solid wood and 120 grit on the plywood.
Next use a floor buffer fitted with a fine grit screening pad to screen sand the flooring. Once you re done sanding make sure you ve gotten rid of all the sanding dust before you do anything. Let s say you complete sanding the example red oak strip floor with grade 100 on the big machine. Use when there is a good deal of flattening of the floor needed.
This fine detail work can make your diy project look more like a professional job. In terms of accepting stain oak in general and red oak in particular is the champ it is almost impossible to get any blotchy spots which is generally the reason for not going past 180 closing off grain can result in blotch. Floors that have been painted may even require you to go tougher and use 24 or 16 grit paper.