Floor Grilles

I had posted something before regarding the new floor vent, but just had to show the finished product with the new paint job against the newly refinished floor. Here is the cold air return at the opposite side of the dining room. It's cast iron from Reggio Registers.

Floor Refinish In Entry Room

In the front door entry section of the house, there is an oak parquet floor. This turned out great with the floor refinish because the parquet is made up of various species of oak and shows different colors. Of course, you can't really see it in the after photo, so you'll just have to take my word.

Floor Refinish In Office

In continuing the floor 'before and after' series, the office floor probably saw the most effort in the refinishing of the floors. This is because half of this room didn't exist when the house was first built so there was a completely different floor on the north side that had to be completely removed. To get the new boards to match, reclaimed floor boards from another building in town were needed, since old growth has a much different look than new growth Douglas Fir.

David at Boardwalk Floors explained that he had to use several thicknesses of plywood below in order to shim to get the floor level. My neighbor also explained that David was there before she left in the morning, and worked well into the evening. I highly recommend him, if you're in Portland.

This is a little closet in the office:


Yesterday, I came across this post, which made my day.

Floor Refinish In Den

Here are some more before and after pictures from the floor refinishing, but this time of the den/front room/family room:



Last Wednesday after the floors had the first sanding, I was able to stop in and take a look. It was looking great with only a few small issues, the biggest being this stain which happens to be the first thing seen after walking in the front door. Fortunately, it sanded out the second time around and is hardly noticable now. It is believed that the stain is actually lamp oil due to how the color changed after the first coat.

Can you see the "hill" on the floor?

Floor Refinish In Dining Room

This last weekend and part of the week before, the dining room had a big jump in progress. I had the floors refinished by David of Boardwalk Floors. He did a great job and I highly recommend him.

See for yourself.

Before:

And after:

Vacuum For Sale

Actually, I take that back. I still have carpet upstairs, but as of last night, there's no more carpet on the first floor. Last night's carpet rippage in the family room was much more successful than the office from the night before, in that the doug fir floors are all intact and in good shape. I'm all the more excited for these new floors. After hanging out in the room, I realized that the soft doug fir floors give a much warmer feel than I was expecting.

Here's Scully, enjoy the last few moments of the carpet.

Carpet Tearout in Office

Last night was the unveiling of my Doug Fir floors in the office (also know as a third bedroom). I was fairly excited, not just because it was another step in the direction of a finished dining room, but also to see the wood floors, that were sure to be in great shape and ready to be easily restored.

Here is a before picture. I should have vaccuumed but what's the point?

And the after picture. In the background are some hideous wide boards that will need to be removed and replaced with new fir floors. The reason they're different is because that part of the house was added on later from the original house.

Below the carpet and padding was this colorful linoleum. Kinda cool, but isn't staying.
Here's a more detailed picture of the "newer" part of the house, with the wide boards that will need to be replaced.

Floor Vent

So far, this has been the easiest part of the dining room remodel. I was even able to get a chunk of it done, while still dealing with the ALL the trick-or-treaters tonight. All 3 of them. I guess the brisk east wind is a little much for them.

Anyway, the vent is currently in the wall.

But, I thought this would interfere with the panel wainscoting too much and I like the looks of the old fashioned floor register. So, today during lunch, I ran around town looking for one, and finally got this one at Rejuvanation for $95. I still need to refinish it, but I'm really liking it already.

I'm also loving my reciprocating saw (Saw-zall). It's so easy to use. I can't believe I functioned without one for so long. I got this hole cut out in less than five minutes.

All that is left is obtaining some duct work, and hooking it all up, and I'm on to the next stage of the dining room remodel.

Day Two of Adhesive Removal

Tonight I was able to get the bulk of the adhesive removal done. It's not much to look at, but here it is:

Not all of it is coming off, so I'll have to go back and apply the nasty removal stuff in spots. Good times.

Adhesive Removal

I started on removing the glue backing of the linoleum tiles tonight. And with plenty of ventilation. It seems to work fairly well, and with less labor than removing the tops of the linoleum which is nice. I just slap a bunch of some nasty adhesive removal on the backing, place plastic over it, roll it out with a brush roller and wait 30 mintues.

After the 30 minutes is up, I use a sidewalk scraper rather than a putty knife to avoid close fumes, and it seems to come up enough to get it ready for sanding.

Just a patch to go

Here's where I am at. I thinking I can get this last patch of lovely linoleum off in a couple of hours. There is some also other little "patches" to tend to, but will be a piece of cake.



Then, it's to the gummy paper backing removal. See all that black stuff? Below it, is a beautiful douglas fir floor. I just have to keep remembering that.

Linoleum Removal

For the last five days, I've been chipping away at removing the linoleum from the wood floor, working anywhere from 1 to 2-1/2 hours per night. It's not as bad as I was expecting it to be, but it's also not that fun. Of course, it's exciting to slowly see the wood floor become uncovered. I think it will be worthwhile.