Waterborne Polyurethane

[Patscga]

Does anyone here have anything bad to say about using this on hardwood floors? Why would you use the regular stuff which takes about 3 times as long to dry? Pat

[dkarnes]

i use varathane wb. no complaints, you just need to add a couple of extra coats. i use gloss and it will dull later on.

[donald girod]

You would use oil-based poly because it produces a different color effect (waterborne results in a very pale, non-grain-enhancing appearance, though there are ways to modify this) and has generally better resistance to things like spilled water (think of a dog dish that sits on it wet overnight). Waterborne is faster to dry, faster to build, and generally more resistant to abrasion if you use good stuff, and you may well prefer the appearance.

[blue]

I have some good points and some difficulties (from our experience). Overall all though, we'd use it again.

the good

---------

1. looks great
2. dries really fast

Now, these benefits can cause some difficulties in certain cirumstances. Our living room floor had VERY thin hardwood, we sanded down as much as we could without sanding the floor away and even though it appeared we had all of the old finish off, tiny bits remained. This caused the finish to not have an even look and appear yellowish in some spots. In this case an oil-based would have worked better to cover the remaining old finish. Upstairs the hardwood was slightly thicker and less worn so we didn't have to sand the floor down to toothpick thickness, got all the old finish off and it looks beautiful. Don't get me wrong, our living room still looks great, no one so far has noticed but us, but it is not near as nice as the upstairs.

My dad did our upstairs for us when he had a couple days off. It happened to be 36 degrees celsius outside which meant it was over 40 in our non air conditioned upstairs. The Verathane was drying so fast that it was VERY difficult for him to get it even. He had to work like insanely fast so one stroke didn't dry before the next and look all streaky. He said under those circumstances, the oil-based was easier to work with because of its slower drying time. Now, it was much cooler when he did the downstairs so he didn't have the same issues, it went just fine.

Oh, and because it dries so fast you don't have as much time to extract fuzz and hairs that may get in it, so make sure check it after every coat. :-)

[nospambob]