Collateral Damage

So I just had another crazy weekend of DIY.  I hate the weekends where you hire equipment because you're really under the gun and have to finish the job in two days because the equipment is going back on Monday. 

My mission was the hall, laundry and ensuite (more on that later) floors which are made of matai.  It's quite interesting to look back on what the hall was like because we've transformed nearly every aspect of it.  I think the only thing still left is the lampshade.  Anyway.  What was still left was the floors.  After we pulled up the horrible carpets we discovered that most of the hall floors were painted mud brown.  (Why?!)

The doorway originally - threadbare carpet, tiled ceiling, flaky paint, textured wallpaper, chipboard panels around the door.

 Here's a shot of the floors just before I started sanding.  Brown paint with paint spots.  But the walls and ceilings are much better since we re-gibbed and re-plastered and painted.

the repainted hall with new doorway but brown painted floorboards

the hall door now with leadlights and repainted, but still with painted floorboards

 So I hired a drum sander and an edge sander for the weekend.  It ended up costing about $275 including the sandpaper.  I used much less sandpaper than I thought I would, considering that I had to strip off paint in the hallway.  This picture shows the process.  I also stripped off the corner of the main bedroom because the long term plan is to turn that into an ensuite with wooden floor (the rest of the room will be carpeted) so it was sensible to strip it at the same time.
In total I used five sheets for the drum sander - 2 coarse, 2 medium, 1 fine, and about 12 for the edge sander - this for the equivalent of about two large rooms.

in the process of sanding

with the drum sander in the laundry

 Here's the hallway stripped and unvarnished.  I had to use a detail sander for the corners (fortunately we had one).


stripped floorboards with no varnish

matai floorboards now with varnish

facing the other way

So doesn't it look nice.  Shame about the collateral damage...
I managed to destroy two extension cables by running over them with the drum sander (difficult to avoid when the machine drives itself).  Fortunately I didn't get a shock.
I also stupidly managed to cut through the PVC pipe connecting one of the heaters with the edge sander (in the UK those pipes are made of copper so I wouldn't have been able to cut through it, but here in nz, flimsy old pvc).  Water spurted out everywhere and the central heating stopped, obviously.  Fortunately it was a quick fix and we managed to get the plumber in on Monday... but all in all my DIY efforts may not have saved us that much money!!!
Plus I have backache from all the sanding...

The hallway looks good - the sanding and varnishing has really lifted it and made it look really welcoming finally but I can see the flaws, (not to mention the collateral damage) - particularly a few places where the drum sander rested for a fraction too long in one place, despite me knowing not to do that.  It is also not as smooth as the kitchen professional sanding job, which could have been the water-based varnish I used.  Difficult to say.  Anyway, I probably saved about $1000 by doing it myself but there's no doubt that the professionals do a better job, and it remains to be seen how much the plumbing repair will cost....