Bench Finish

[Eric John]

Good morning,

To the watco experienced:

So I just finished flattening the top, and I slathered on a coat of watco, I never used watco b4. and now I'm wondering. I realize its only one coat and im thinking its going to need 4-5.

I used to use granpa's recipe, varnish,oil, and mineral spirits in equal parts.

are these two finishes that much different? Im not really wanting a film finish, just something to seal well against the humidity here. am I going down the wrong road?

Thanx for your help
Eric

[Terry Beadle]

The finish on a work bench is a bit of a situation of preferences. Frank Klause uses a well finished finish. This gives him a surface that will clean readily but it's a bit slippery IMO. I use a 50/50 blend of BLO and that very sparingly. This gives the surface good grip but still makes glue up clean up fairly easy. I also like it's ability to be card scraped for especially messy areas and a quick wipe to put new spots back to spec.

Some folks don't put any finish on.

A lite coat of Danish Oil will also work.

I guess the rule I follow is a lite coat of any finish will do. Even a stain will work but I like a light colored work bench top to make plane adjustments clearer.

I think your granpa's recipe is a very good path to follow. Just my 2 cents.

Enjoy the process !

[glenn bradley]

People have differing thoughts on this but, I would avoid the varnish. I don't want a film finish on my bench. I stick to BLO and some paste wax when cured. Of course, some people don't like a smooth bench and avoid the wax. I have re-waxed the bench-top about once a year and have done a light touch-up of the BLO where I gouged and repaired the top surface. Other than that, I just use it.

[Sam Murdoch]

More than 2 coats of Watco on anything other than the most porous wood accomplishes nothing. The Watco will saturate the wood pores and dry nicely leaving a nice color. As you know it will not create a film on the surface so it will never need to be "repaired".
Once each year if you like you can sand the bench and reapply a coat of Watco. I think it is a good sealer for a work bench.

[Howard Acheson]

A film finish (lacquer, shellac, varnish, poly varnish) is not the way to finish a workbench top. A workbench is going to get dinged and film finishes will crack or craze or be otherwise damaged. Once a film finish is penetrated, it looses its effectiveness and adjacent areas begin to fail. No treatment is going to make a soft wood benchtop harder. I much favor a "in the wood finish". Here are two that lots of folks find effective.

First, is an boiled linseed oil and wax finish. Sand the surface to 180 grit. Mix paraffin or bees wax into heated boiled linseed oil. USE A DOUBLE BOILER TO HEAT THE OIL. The ratio is not critical but about 5-6 parts of boiled linseed oil in a double boiler with one part paraffin or beeswax shaved in. Take it off the stove. Thin this mixture about 50/50 with mineral spirits to make a heavy cream like liquid. Apply this mixture to the benchtop liberally and allow to set overnight. Do it again the next day and again the following day if the top continues to absorb it. After a final overnight, lightly scrape off any excess wax and buff. This finish will minimize the absorbsion of any water and you can use a damp rag to wipe up any glue excess. Dried glue will pop right off the surface. Renewal or repair is easy. Just use a scraper to remove and hardened stuff, wipe down with mineral spirits using a 3/0 steel wool pad (a non-woven green or gray abrasive pad is better), wipe off the gunk and apply another coat of mineral oil/wax mixture.

My personal preference is for an oil/varnish mixture treatment. Either use Minwax Tung Oil Finish, Minwax Antique oil or a homebrew of equal parts of boiled linseed oil, your favorite varnish or poly varnish and mineral spirits. Sand the benchtop up to 180 grit. Apply the mixture heavily and keep it wet for 15-30 minutes. Wipe off any excess completely. Let it dry overnight and the next day, apply another coat using a gray non-woven abrasive pad. Let it set and then wipe off any excess. Let this dry 48-72 hours. To prevent glue from sticking apply a coat of furniture paste wax and you're done. This treatment is somewhat more protective than the wax and mineral oil as the varnish component adds some protection from not only water both some other chemicals also. The waxing makes the surface a little more impervious to water so you can wipe up any liquid adhesive. It also allows hardened adhesive to be scraped off. Repair and renewal is easy. Just go through the same scraping, wiping down with mineral spirits and reapplication of the BLO/varnish/mineral spirits mixture and an application of paste wax.

Both of the above treatments are quite protective but are easy to maintain and renew. They do not fail when the surface takes a ding.

[sheldon pettit]

Finish your top any way you desire, do it once and forget about it getting damaged, go buy a sheet of 1/4/ 1/2 /3/4" plywood that has high pressure laminate on it, cut up and make a cap to fit over your new finished top, let it take the beating and gluing and staining or anything else you use a top for. Want a natural look instead? then buy UV cured finish that the cabinet makers use instead for prefinished interior kitchen cabinet areas etc., nice look hard as nails, can get it either in one side or two side finished. drill a whole in it so you can hang it on a wall if you want to take it off and expose the real top underneath.

This way, even if you want to make your real top out of an exotic wood like rosewood or goncola alves, you can do so and not have to worry about it getting damaged.