Hello All,

I am a tech ed teacher and was asked an interesting question by one of my student's today, which I do not have an answer too. A few students of mine are making some gavels for extra credit and they turned out really well. They decided to stain them a dark mahogany color however, they forgot to wipe the excess stain off of their projects. After about 8 hours the stain is almost dry, but obviously still tacky in some areas. I told them they could use some lacquer thinner and wipe off the excess, and the stuff that did soak into the wood would be ok. This is what I usually do when this happens, as you can imagine it is pretty common that 13 year olds forget to wipe off the extra.

However, this student said they liked the way it looked and wanted to wait for it to dry. Is there any reason we can't just wait for it to dry a day or two, and then clear coat over it like any other stain? I can't figure out why this wouldn't work, but the can does warn against leaving the excess stain on the project. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Steve

P.S. I called minwax and they said that it would craze (sp?) any clear coat for some reason. I'm not sure why it would do that if it was dry....