How to Get Glue off Wood Floor

LESLIE: Michelle is on the line from Los Angeles, California with a cleaning question about how to get glue off wood floor. How on Earth did you spill some glue on your floor? Tell us about it.

MICHELLE: Well, this is an interesting story. My fiancé and I just bought a condo and it needed some renovations. We weren’t planning on buying a fixer-upper; it’s just how it worked out. And one of the things was the floors.

He decided that he would install them himself; he’d done it once before. And so these floors required a glue, which a lot of folks like – we know a lot of people and people were like, “Glue? I never heard of glue.” But that’s what the lady that we bought the floors from said, so we got this really intense glue.

And he kind of slammed through these floors pretty quickly and now I have this glue in fingerprint and bulges on top of the floors. It’s really terrible. And I’m just wondering – we’ve tried – the turpentine works but it takes the finish off. That’s what you’re supposed to use to get it off your tools and off your hands and stuff? But it takes the finish off the floor. We’ve tried these 5505 wipes that are like $20 to get glue off wood floor; that didn’t work. Those are the recommended product: the anti-product to the glue. We’ve tried something called Goof Off or Goo Off or something like that. I don’t know if you have a trick but this glue is really intense.

TOM: I think what you’re going to have to do is try to get glue off wood floor as best as you can but you – just buy into the fact that you’re going to probably want to refinish these after you get glue off wood floor. And it’s not that big of a deal, by the way. What you could do is get everything off and then what I would do is I would sand the whole surface. And you could rent a floor buffer with a sanding screen. It’s not like a caustic, rough belt sander.

MICHELLE: Sure. But I don’t think with a sanding screen …

TOM: No. You put a sanding screen on it and it abrades just sort of the upper surface of the floor.

MICHELLE: OK.

TOM: And then once you get that all abraded and even if you have to sand down deeper in the areas that are really bad, it’s OK. Because you get it all abraded and you get it all roughed up just a little bit with the floor buffer and the sanding screen. Clean it up really good so you have no dust and then you get some urethane – clear urethane. You want to use semi-gloss. And you apply that with a lambswool applicator.

Now, that kind of looks like a mop for a kitchen except there’s lambswool on the end of it. And you essentially pour a little urethane in a paint tray and you mop it on very carefully and very smoothly, working out of the room. And then give it a day or two and it’ll dry and you should be good to go.

Now, the one other thing I would do is check with the manufacturer of the hardwood floor to see if there’s a specific floor finish that they recommend for refinishing, because I’m not quite sure what they did initially.

MICHELLE: Thank you very much.

TOM: You’re very welcome, Michelle. Good luck with that project and congratulations on your upcoming wedding.

Hey, if you survive the home improvement, you’ll survive the marriage, OK?

MICHELLE: We’ve been living together five years, so this kind of thing is not new, honestly.

TOM: It’s nothing, huh? Alright, Michelle.

MICHELLE: Thank you very much.

TOM: Take care.