I've never done a tutorial before, but I've had a lot of people ask us about our floors, so I decided to put it out there in case anyone might benefit from our experience. I'll start with a quick back story.
My husband and I stumbled upon a property for sale that we absolutely loved. It was 20 acres, partially wooded, and extremely close to town. The only drawback was that it was also home to a double wide, which we did not particularly love. I like to believe that I am pretty open minded about aesthetics, but this thing was pretty hideous. It was in good condition, but definitely needed a major interior face lift. We eventually want to build on this property and get rid of the double wide, so after successfully closing on the property we started trying to come up with cheap and creative ideas for remodeling. Flooring was extremely difficult because the DW is over 1,800 sq ft and having dogs, we hate carpet. Everything we looked at was going to run us over $2/sq ft and we just didn't want to sink that kind of money into it. So, after scouring the internet for ideas, this is what we ended up doing.
Our first step was picking out Plywood that we liked and was reasonably priced. Not as easy as you'd think. Thankfully, when we were ready to buy the wood Menards was having a sale on 1/4 birch veneer plywood. It was over $10 off a for a 4' x 8' sheet. We ordered a bunk (50 sheets) to start with. This cost us right around $800 and would cover a bit under 1,500 sq/ft. We then had the boards ripped into 1' x 8' boards.
We toyed around with various ways to lay and secure the boards. We looked at using laminate glue and laying them almost like tile, but that was going to get extremely pricey. Almost the cost of the wood itself. We decided on using a combo of sub-floor glue and nails. At first we were only applying the glue to the center of the boards, but after laying about 2 rows, we discovered that is was better to apply it to the edges to make sure the the boards didn't ever pop up on the sides.
After gluing a board down we then nailed each board in place as well. We made a "nail template" that you can see below to ensure that all the boards were nailed down evenly. You can't really see the nail holes now that they're done, but it was very handy to have. We used a chalk line to start with squared up to the center of the house and then we just started putting boards down like it was a normal hardwood floor.
We used 1" straight nails to secure the boards. I really wanted to use hardcut masonry nails, but this would have added not only significant cost, but significant time as well. I would have loved the look that the masonry nails added, but I'm glad we went with the cheaper/faster method.
Measuring and cutting was definitely the most time consuming part of the process. Luckily my husband has a good head for math and took care of it.
After the floors were down we sanded everything with an electric hand sander and 220 grit paper. We considered the idea for renting a floor sander, but were concerned that we might go through the veneer on the plywood which we definitely didn't want to happen. There were quite a few spots where the boards were slightly uneven where the edges so we sanded those down. In the really bad spots we went ahead and sanded through the veneer to even them out and it gave the floor more of a rustic look which we really like. After sanding we vacuumed the floors and went over them with tack cloth to pick up any remaining dirt or sawdust.
These are the floors after being sanded and prepped. You could potentially skip the next steps and go straight to sealing them at this point if you wanted a lighter floor. We wanted dark almost black floors so at this point we started the staining process.
The stain we used was Miniwax Ebony. You can use any color or brand that you want, just make sure you test it on a board before applying it. Seems like common sense, but I have been known to simply buy a paint color without testing it out first, so I thought I'd mention it. Patience isn't my best virtue.
We used a deck pad stain applicator to apply the stain. We put it on pretty thick to make sure that the edges and nail holes got stained and there weren't any sneaky natural birch spots showing through. We applied stain on 2 rows of boards at a time, allowed it to sit for 5-10 minutes and then wiped away any excess. Then we rinsed and repeated. It wasn't a hard process, but it is frustrating that you can only do 2 rows at a time, otherwise it's too difficult to reach the boards and remove any excess stain.
After the first coat the floors were a bit splotchy and uneven. Honestly, I kind of liked the way they looked with only one coat. If I hadn't wanted them a little bit darker I may have tried to convince the DH to leave them with only one coat.
After the second coat of stain I was happy we went with 2 the color was just so much richer! It's hard to tell from the photo, but it really warmed up the floors.
Once all the floors had their second coat of stain we were ready for the sealer. We went with a product called Bona Mega Clear HD and I must say I was pretty thrilled with it. We chose the satin finish. There are a couple of ways to apply it but we went with a T-bar. From all the videos I watched it seemed to be the easiest and fastest application method.
I wish I had taken some video of the actual application process, but sadly I didn't. You can find a few different videos on Youtube if you are really interested in it. The sealer took 2 coats. One gallon covered about 550 Sq Ft for us. We let the first coat sit and cure for about 2 hours before applying the second coat.
This photo shows the difference that the sealer has on the color. It really makes everything pop!
Here are some photos of the finished floors.
As you can see the Bona gave everything a beautiful even sheen.
We left the wood in the bathroom natural because we wanted a darker paint color. This gives you a good idea of how it will look if you decide not to stain the floors and go straight to sealing them.
Well there you have it. We kind of lost track of how much stain we used, but after tallying everything up our cost came in at about $1 Sq Ft. Not too bad. I hope this might help anyone else who is trying to do some low cost flooring. I'll update later on how they are wearing with our 2 dogs as well as some pictures once the baseboards are up.
