Fuel for Thought

Little Things

Little things can have a big impact. As a truck owner, many times, time off can mean time to work on the truck, whether for maintenance or even just upgrades, large or small. You have probably seen the video from The Crafty Trucker, check it out  The Crafty Trucker

While off this past week,  I decided to seal and finish the floor in the box of my truck. All of my previous truck’s floors came prefinished with a durable clear coat, this one did not, just bare hardwood.

After more than two years of use, it was starting to show stains from various sources like forklift wheels, warehouse dust and dirt and even some metal rack and tool box stains.

When new, a good clear coat will keep these stains out of the wood, but after they are in, they can be hard to almost impossible to remove.

You can try sanding the floor, and it will help remove many stains, but there may be some that are still too deeply soaked into the wood that complete removal is not possible. Clear coating over stains will just guarantee that they will remain a blemish on your floor after all the work you put in to get a nice finish.

Old Floor

One solution, and the one I used, is to stain the floor a little darker to help it all blend and be uniform in color. Then seal with several coats of polyurethane or shellac. It will also help make cleanup easier.

In between clear coats, you can add some grit in the form of fine sand, and seal it between coats. This will still give a nice looking finish, but also add some grip to reduce slipping when you have wet shoes or track snow or ice in with you.