June 3, 2013
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Staining the desk
I like old-fashioned stain, the kind you brush on and wipe off, leaving whatever has soaked into the wood. There are tinted varnishes but they’re tricky and unforgiving. There are stains that have varnish included, but I don’t trust those either.
Somewhere I’ve misplaced all my painting stuff. So I’m applying the stain with an old sock. Note how I’m using nitril gloves. When I was younger (a year or two ago) I used to do this bare-handed. Now I’m an old fuddy-duddy who looks after his nails.
The desk has been chemically stripped and sanded as clean and bare as I can get it. It doesn’t get rid of all the old color (there’s some dark color in the grain and some of the dents) but enough that the new finish will look good.
They call this tiger oak or quarter-sawed oak because it’s cut on an angle to bring out those cool stripes. For the plywood, the veneer was also cut at the quarter angle and glued in strips.
The stain gets slopped on and spread around. It has to sit 5-15 minutes and then I wipe it off. Here you can see blemishes of the old stain, like age spots.
The end result looks quite different from the bare wood, and lighter and more even than the original finish.
In a couple of days when it’s good and dry, I’ll varnish it with oil-based polyurethane. My one experiment with water-based poly was a disaster.
Here’s what the desk bases look like. They’re darker because they seemed to have a darker original finish than the top, and it was really hard to strip them down to bare wood. It will still look good, I think.
Comments (23)
The desktop is beautiful! Such character
. peace always
That’s nice
It looks great. Nice job.
I like the aged look the remnants of an old finish give when a new finish is applied. I’m on the same page with you regarding the stain. The rub on, rub off stuff is the best as far as I’m concerned. I think it gives me a lot more control of the final color. I always wear my gloves and apply it with a cloth.
I’ve had good luck with water based polyurethane in the past. I always put several coats.
I need to do this to the swinging bench I have on my front porch.
I’ve never got the hang of the all-in-wonder products, or the water-based “no VOC” poly. I guess we anachronisms just have to stick to the tried and true.
Good job!
Does all this smell not affect you? I love to paint, but the emanations of the chemicals are horrible.
The table looks nice.
@carlo - My nose is always so congested that I don’t smell much. Stain doesn’t have a strong smell anyway, although I do remember it from when I could smell (it smells kind of like dirt). The varnish will be more pungent.
Looks awesome, such beautiful warm tones. Do you ever work with paste wax for a final coat, instead of poly?
Good Job Tim!
Beautiful! I love that old quarter sawn oak. We made our furniture out of cherry because a lot of the Craftsman stuff was made of it and is so gorgeous. We used the wipe on varnish for our last few projects and had good results.
@WildWomanOfTheWest - My dad used paste wax for a few things. I’ve never tried it. I don’t think I’d use it for a desk, but maybe for something that doesn’t get touched as much.
I used to seal my new projects before staining when I did wood working. Don’t miss it at all. Looks like it’s gonna be a nice finish.
@wematter - Thank you. I’ve used sealer once or twice, and it was helpful for wood that tended to absorb stain unevenly. But the sealer blocked the ability to absorb much stain at all. I’ve never used it on a refinishing project.
Yes, new wood only, except for ukulele’s almost screwed up my home made tenor uke by sealing the sound board. Luckily after it dried out a couple of months later, it came back, gcea never sounded better.
The wood is looking so beautiful, & the desk looks to be really big, yay! Great job!
I like your work : the table looks like being made with old wood with your wax process .
I like also te wooden chest .
In friendship,Tim,
Michel
RYC : I confess I drink also wine during the meals at midday and in the evening . But this tends to make me sleep so I have to be prudent and drinking drop to drop, a wee bit at first, then a little more and to stop in time .
I live in Northern France where there are not vineyards but a lot of brewers .( North of France ,and Alsace) and in the foreign countries of Europe: Belgum, Netherland and Germany for intance )
@fauquet - The Alsatians are culturally like Germans, aren’t they? They speak German and make sauerkraut.
Wow!!! Looks great!!! You are so good at DIY handy-man home-improvement tim-allen-grunt projects!
I have refinished dressers and tables. I know that might surprise you. And I especially enjoyed my trips to The Home Depot.
HUGS!!!
@adamswomanback - You enjoy trips to anywhere that the employees are mostly male.
@Roadkill_Spatula - Yes. Yes, I do.
love it!
that looks good, you must save quite a bit of money by doing a lot of work yourself.