Finish Schedule Hard Maple

[George Bokros]

I will soon be finishing a sewing machine cabinet my is having made from hard maple. It will come sanded to 100 grit. We are not sure if it will be finished with pigmented stain or dye. Maybe GF water based dye stain.

If using dye here is what I am thinking for finish schedule:

Sand to 220 grit with 320 for end grain.

If using water based stain I will spritz with distilled water to raise grain then re-sand with appropriate grit.

Dye (not sure if alcohol or water based)

Finish with GF Arm-R-Seal

Will this work for GF dye stain, TransTint or TransFast dye?

If using pigmented stain here is what I am thinking for finish schedule:

Sand to 220 grit with 320 for end grain.

Seal with Zinsser Seal coat reduced 50% (approximate 1# cut)

Stain

Finish with GF Arm-R-Seal

Choice of dye (what I prefer because of the tendency of maple to blotch) or stain will be dependent upon color LOML decides on. She wants to finish it similar to the originals from the 1940's (this is a reproduction being made for her). I am not even sure if a combination of garnet and amber de-waxed shellac would produce the coloration she wants. It just gets expensive buying samples for test finishes. At Woodcraft a 1/2# of de-waxed shellac is $32, buy one of each and you have $60 sunk.

I know I have posted recently about finishing hard maple, I believe these questions are more technical than I posted before.

Thanks

George

[David Eisenhauer]

I can respond to your "Dye" option. My method: 1) sand to 220, 2) sand end grain 320 or whatever I have that is finer than 220, 3) raise the grain by wiping with a damp sponge (dampened with the same tap water I mix the dye with) 4) apply water-mixed Transtint (either by hand wiping with a dye-rag or spraying. If I spray, the spray may be followed by a wipe down - possibly not wiped down), 5) spray one coat de waxed shellac over the Transtint dye job to fix the dye in place, 6) Start spraying coats of whatever Target topcoat I want to use. As for step 4, I test out the dye application on scrap pieces dropped off from the wood I am using for the project and make sure to include the "blotch making" swirls or patches in the test piece to see if blotching is going to be a problem. Smaller pieces, I hand apply the dye, larger pieces I spray. I may have put on two coats of the shellac at times, but normally one coat. I have used HVLP spray equipment exclusively now for 10-15 years. Last thought - make sure your sanding has gotten rid of any odd scratch, because hard maple will show it bad after the color is applied (less so with dye than stain, but still there).

[Kent A Bathurst]

I kinda follow along with David, but a couple differences - plus - me no got spray gear.

1. Sand to 220
2. Sand end grain with 320 or 400 3M gold - important - this burnishes the end grain somewhat, inhibiting dye absorption - the game plan is to have the end grain come out with the same color depth/intensity as the surface.
3. No grain-raising - unnecessary for me - waste of time.
4. Padding cloth to put down 2 very light seal coats of 1# dewaxed ultra pale shellac
5. Using a small brush [maybe 1/4" flat artist bristle] I brush on 2 more coats on teh end grain only - being very carefulto stay away from the flat surfaces. This is also to inhibit dye absorption.
6. Very light pass with 400g Gold over everything.
7. Transfast powder not Traistint liquid in water.
8. Let the dye sit overnight. The powder dye yields very, very little color lift. That is the achilles' heel of the liquid - in which case, you have to go with David's spray shellac - The Zinnser aerosol is a 2# cut, and works fine.
9. Couple more seal coats
10 very light 400g to smooth things down.

At this point there is no raised grain issues - I got alla that stuff taken care of.

It only takes a little experimenting on a piece of scrap to dial in the brush coats on the end grain - with the burnishing and the extra shellac, I end up with a dead-nuts color match. I just never liked the "much darker" end grain. YMMV

Then - finish coat[s].


And - George - yeah, you end up investing in flakes, but they last forever in a ziplock in the fridge or freezer.

Ima go rummage around my freezer in a minute. I should have some garnet in there somewhere - and I seem to recall I bought some amber at one point. If I have some, I can get you in the "test samples" game at n/c.

Will advise

EDIT: - OK. got some dark garnet dewaxed. NO amber, but I have dewaxed pale #3 - much deeper than it sounds - all my flakes from Jewitt/Homestead Finishing - you can see the colors at his Homestead Finishing site

PM if you wanna get hooked up.

Kent

[Scott Holmes]

Depending on how dark you want the final project; 220 and 320 is probably too fine. IMHO sanding bare wood past 220 is a waste of time and sand paper. I usually stop at 150 or 180. Also, using the ex-fine papers too long (e.g. sanding with worn out paper) burnishes the wood and causes additional coloring problems.

TransTint dye is water and alcohol soluble TransFast is water soluble. Sealing TransFast with shellac will not move the dye around after it has dried.

I don't bother raising the grain...Here's a quote from my finishing class notes

"...Raising the grain and lightly sand before you apply the water borne product is a waste of time. After the first few coats of finish, the raised whiskers will be hard and locked in place, now they can be easily sanded off, while you level the finish."

Now you don't have to worry about sanding through and removing the dye color from the wood. Also the little whiskers are IN the finish and should help show more depth. You can't feel the difference after the project is done; but you can see a better, deeper looking finish..

[Kent A Bathurst]

There we go - Obi-Wan Holmes has stated the issues more succinctly than I can.

And - he corrected me on one error in my comments - I, too, stop at 150 or 180 before starting the finishing. In fact - I have not noticed a difference, so it is 150 most of time. I was focused on the knock-down steps in the finishing schedule.

Once again, thanx, Sir.

Kent

[Prashun Patel]

I think either schedule is fine. I vote for dye vs stain. Dye looks more professional imho. Beware how thick you make the armrseal. It looks plasticky when built up, imho.

[George Bokros]

Beware how thick you make the armrseal. It looks plasticky when built up, imho.

I put six coats of Arm-R-Seal on a sugar pine apothecary cabinet I made for the wife and it came out very nice. It was a satin finish this project will be a gloss finish. The wood trim in my father-in-laws house looked pasticky. It was heavily finished with the original Varathane product in the 50's. I did not like that look at all.

George

[George Bokros]

EDIT: - OK. got some dark garnet dewaxed. NO amber, but I have dewaxed pale #3 - much deeper than it sounds - all my flakes from Jewitt/Homestead Finishing - you can see the colors at his Homestead Finishing site

PM if you wanna get hooked up.

Kent

Thanks for the offer on the shellac Kent, very generous. Let me think about it for a day or so and if I want to take you up I will PM you.

George

[David Eisenhauer]

I agree 150-180 # sanding on most woods, but I have found hard maple to be a little more exacting on making sure all of the scratches are gone. Admittedly, I went through several hard maple projects several years ago, less now, so maybe I should revisit it when I come across hard maple again. I have learned more about using the "raking light" to find problems since then as well. As for the grain raising, my original thought was to get the bulk of the sanding over with before ever lifting a gun and don't find the raised-grain scuffing to be very time consuming. But, I like the idea of the whiskers helping to show more depth and will try that next time around. Obi-Wan, thanks for attending a class for me (hope it didn't cost too much) and passing the knowledge along.

[Kent A Bathurst]

Thanks for the offer on the shellac Kent, very generous. Let me think about it for a day or so and if I want to take you up I will PM you.

George

Hey - it's free for you. As long as you wanna give it a legit shot, I will never miss it.

[George Bokros]

Would you recommend sealing water based WD Lockwood dye with a 1" cut ultra blonde shellac (don't want the shellac to effect the color) before applying ArmRSeal as the final finish?

Thanks

George

[Prashun Patel]

Not necessary to seal ws dye before arm r seal.

[Kent A Bathurst]

The ultra blonde seal coat[s] will not affect the color - this stuff is as light in color as shellac can be - you cannot tell it is there, in a couple light coats at 1#+/- cut.

I always seal it; habit I have developed - I like to seal off each coat of color to eliminate any "lift" with next coat, or with finish coats.

And - as just noted in another thread - it flashes so quickly that you can pretty much immediately start 2d coat as soon as you are done with first, and are basically ready to go immediately [though I tend to wait 15 minutes or so, mainly because I gotta screw around getting the next material ready to go]. No real added time.

[George Bokros]

UPDATE:

Now thinking about using garnet or amber shellac and tinting it with some TransTint dye to adjust the color. My though process is that this would eliminate the splotching problem and still get the color the LOML wants on her cabinet.

Your thoughts??


George

[Prashun Patel]

I vote to test pure dye on raw wood. No shellac. I rarely get blotch with dye.