Danish Oil Dud

[Barb Delong]

I am new to furniture finishing so any help would be greatly appreciated. I used a chemical stripper to strip white, oil based paint from the top of an antique mahogany desk. I removed the stripper with mineral spirts and sanded. Basically, I followed the instructions on the bottle of stripper.

I used Danish Oil to finish the top, also following directions on can, with less than desired results. It looks great in some places; rich warm color, other places it looks dry, with a white tint. Admittedly, there were a few flecks of paint deep in the grain that I could not remove, but not enough to cause the finished effect.

I've used Danish Oil before and loved the results. It was always on wood that had never been painted though.

Any my ideas on how to salvage my project? Thanks!

[John TenEyck]

It sounds like the surface has variable porosity and some areas are sucking up more finish than others. When you apply a coat of oil does it dry uniformly or are the dry spots drying first? If so, that's the problem. If that's the case you can either keep applying more coats of Danish oil until those porous areas are satisfied and you get a uniform sheen, or you could wipe on a coat or two of dewaxed shellac to seal the surface and then use a wiping varnish for the final couple of coats.

OR

It could be that you didn't really get all the old finish off and the dry areas are still clogged with varnish from the paint. If the dry areas do not absorb the Danish oil more quickly than the areas that look good, then I think that's the problem. The only solution then is to strip it again, or twice even. Sometimes I've had to strip a piece two or three times to really get all of the finish out of the pores, even if some pigment is still left behind. Once the finish is really out of the pores the Danish oil should absorb into those areas that looked dry before.

John

[Barb Delong]

Hi John and thank you for your reply. Yes, it did absorb more on the dry areas. I kept reapplying the oil to those spots for 3 hours, it didn't appear to be absorbing much more. I'm afraid you are right, I'll have to strip again. I did 2 rounds of stripper, thought it was enough. I guess not. Thanks again!