I've been working on a couple of keepsake boxes for the grand kids and had an accident with one of them. I accidentally bumped it with a small, blunt metal object and put a small depression in it. My concern is that, along with stain and prefinish shellac, there are 5 coats of lacquer on it and I was getting ready to do a final buffing on it.
The wood is curly soft maple and the ding, as shown in the picture, is about 1/8" wide and I would guess about 1/64 or less deep. And, of course, this happened on the front face of the box.
In the past I've had somewhat success using the steam iron method to raise the grain on bare wood, but was never able to get it back completely. I'm thinking that method won't work in this situation because of all the finish layers on it. My only thought is to use wood filler and a few more coats of finish, but I thought I'd ask the experts here for advice.