Why Sanding is Crucial in Exterior Wood Refinishing
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Hey everyone, we thought it was important to do a short little segment on, I guess, sort of the dos and don’ts of maintenance. So we’re here in Los Angeles at a really large commercial project, and what’s entailed in what we do for them is—when we come out to do maintenance—uh, mind you, we were out, I don’t know, initially 5–6 years ago. We refinished everything, got it up to speed, and then since then we’ve been maintaining it according to what they want. I guess, you know, definitely budget’s a thing, but they want us to clean it and brighten and apply the coating only.
And while you can do that technically after you’ve refinished, you really have to be on point with the timing. Because once it crosses the threshold—no pun intended—it will turn gray and oxidize. And they, we, us—everybody—hasn’t been as diligent on getting that timing exactly correct, especially on a huge project like this. So we’ve been cleaning and brightening when it technically probably needed to be sanded. And while you can get a little bit of color, some color change, and yes, the wood is nourished because it has the oil in it, it doesn’t necessarily look the same. It doesn’t look as good as it can.
You know, we’re going for perfection. That’s why you and people are hiring us, is because we want to make sure that everything is to the best quality and the best look we possibly can get. And when we’re cleaning and brightening and putting the coating on and not sanding, we are compromising—especially when it’s crossed the threshold of needing maintenance.
Alright guys, so here’s a perfect example of a color difference of what the wood should be if we sanded it. You could see here on the back wall, you could see here on this little area here. One of the reasons why you see such a dramatic color difference is because vertical surfaces weather differently than horizontals. Everything that faces up takes a huge beating—UV, rain, foot traffic, everything that lands on it—so that’s brutal. The sidings don’t necessarily get that, so you see a color difference.
Also on the floor, again, what we’re talking about is it’s just been maintenance—it’s been maintained past the point of maintenance, if you will. And that means that it has turned gray. Unfortunately, the principal here hasn’t necessarily been as on point as they possibly could have been, and it is weathered gray when it needed to be sanded. And we’ve just been power washing and putting the coating on according to their budget and what they wanted to do.
And I know they have signed up to do the refinishing later on this year. It’s definitely overdue, and that’s just what we wanted to point out—that, you know, once it crosses the threshold of maintenance, it turns into a refinishing and it needs more work. Otherwise, you’ll get mediocre results.
Also, if your deck has turned gray and it has weathered and it needs refinishing, we can’t just simply power wash and brighten and put the coating. You can do that, but you’re going to get mediocre results like you’re going to see in a little while, and it’s just not optimal.
I know there’s lots of disgusting blow-and-go finishing pros out there that are just coming out to your home offering a low price, power washing, and slapping some oil on there. If your deck is weathered, or it has a coating that’s blistering or peeling or wearing off, it needs to be sanded. If it’s a refinishing job, it needs to be sanded. That’s the most important step.
And again, that evil, disgusting devil—the blow-and-go finishing pro—is trying to skip processes, trying to do it the lazy way, the cheap way. But it’s definitely a gigantic compromise. Like you can see on this deck—it looks okay, it’s acceptable—but we don’t want just acceptable. We want to knock it out of the park. It’s not the right way to do it, and these are the results.
So definitely the moral of this long-winded segment that I’m doing here is: when you’re doing a finishing, it needs to be sanded 100%. We can’t skip that if we’re crossing the threshold into a refinishing rather than a maintenance. So say we came 3 years ago and the deck has weathered—it needs to be sanded again. We can’t skip that step.
So if we’re quoting you 6 to 8 months where your deck or your furniture needs maintenance, it needs to be 6 to 8 months. It can’t be 12 months once and then have the same work or same price as if we were right on time. So if it goes past the projected time frame of 6 to 8 to 12 months and it’s 2 years, 3 years, 5 years, it’s not simply a maintenance anymore—it’s a full refinish. And that’s the intention of this segment. I hope you liked it.