How to Remove Hardwood Flooring
- 1). Remove the floor trim all around the room, using a hammer and pry bar. If you're planning on reusing the trim, remove it carefully to avoid breaking it. Otherwise, just rip it out.
- 2). Set your circular saw to the depth of the floor boards. This can be 3/8-inch, 1/2-inch or 3/4-inch; if you don't know which it is, start at the smallest setting (3/8-inch) and do a test cut to see if it goes all the way through the board and just grazes the surface of the subfloor. If not, move to the next deepest setting.
- 3). Position your saw blade at one wall, about 3 feet from a side wall. The blade should be perpendicular to the direction of the wood planks, so you'll be cutting across them. Run the saw across the width of the room. Move another 3 feet over and do the same thing. Continue until you've cut lines across the floorboards every 3 feet.
- 4). Work your crowbar into the first cut line, using the hammer to get the edge of the crow bar under the end of the floorboards. Pry them up.
- 5). Continue along the line, and then along the other line, prying up two or three of the cut boards at a time. Stop occasionally to stack the loose boards out of your way. Continue until all the boards are up.
- 6). Go over the floor with your hammer and knock down or pull up any remaining nail heads. Use your floor scraper to take up any residual glue or paper underlayment.
