Yr 4 - Day 60 ish

Spent the weekend laying and finishing flooring in Bob's office. Used up the last of the wide board pine that was laid in the LR when we bought the house. Most of it was used to floor the MBR but I had kept the decent-ish amount that was left as it was quite a lot of wood. Finally it has been put to use, we have a floor in the office that is not faux crazy-paving linoleum form 1965 and I have more space in the garage! An all-around success.
Laying went well after the very first piece which was a challenge as I had to join into the tongue of the T&G flooring from the DR. The pine I was laying had no T&G and I did not have a table router to cut tongues. After much brain racking I remembered I had a stair nose piece in my offcuts bin. Then how to rip the nose off it so that I had flat one side and keep the groove on the other. of course after much headscratching, Heath Robinson rigging with the circular saw (I also have no work bench or vise) I headed to HD in the hopes of tracking down a fence for my saw.
Of course, no chance of HD stocking something so specialized and all they had was a "universal" fence. I alwasy think that when it comes to tools, "universal" means "doesn't do the job very well". However, I did not want to be sanding the floor when Bob's new computer was set-up so I bought it. Long story short it worked well-enough and in fact I ripped down quite a few boards with it.
Nice thing with 11.5" boards is that you get a lot of coverage for just a few cuts. I laid it over resin paper and I know that there are two layers of 5/8-3/4" subfloor underneath. Even so I nailed it to the joists which I calculated from the nail holes in the 1/4" ugly plywood (yes, another project to come).
As usual it took longer than I thought. Did half Saturday and then finished it by Sunday lunch. Didn't look fab but it was still to be sanded. Of course a trip to HD was needed to find really course sanding pads - coursest I could get was 50 grit.
Then four coats of Varathane. This is a water-based polyurethane which I picked for quick drying (2hrs), low smells and easy clean-up. Vacuumed and mineral spirits prior to applying with a 4" nylon brush.
After each coat I then had to kill 2 hrs. Weather was on my side - a heatwave: 85 degrees and 30% humidity meant the floor was dry in about 1 hr 45 mins.
Got the final (4th) coat on just after midnight. It looked very nice this a.m., can be walked on lightly in stocking feet. No furniture or heavy traffic for 3 days.
Fortunately this was less than 50 sq. ft. Pics to come.