Finishing

We like oil finishes on our woodworking projects.  They create a beautiful finish, accentuate grains, and offer great protection for the wood surface. There are a variety of oils that work well on wood, and we’ve written about some of them, including linseed oil and boiled linseed oil, Danish oil, and teak oil. We’ve also … Read more

We all want our woodworking projects to turn out well and seek a professional appearance when completed.  Accurate cuts, solid assembly, and stain or paint all play an important part in that process, but the final touch is the finish.  When it comes to finishes, there are many choices, from polyurethane to varnish, to shellac, … Read more

We know it to be a durable finish on our woodworking projects, and we’ve all likely used it in our shop.  It’s a protective finish that saves the wood from heat (to a degree, pun intended) and moisture.  Key Points: It sits on the wood surface rather than penetrates into the wood like other finishes … Read more

Reaching the point in a woodworking project where a decision needs to be made means we’ve chosen our wood, cut the wood into the right pieces and shapes, and assembled our project. Each of those choices was made with some care – the project and the wood.  Key Points: Each of those steps to cut … Read more

We woodworkers make all sorts of things to work within our shop, from jigs to fences, to all sorts of workarounds and such, and it is always satisfying to do that for ourselves.  We always have scrap pieces of this wood and that wood to play with, and the limits of what we can do … Read more

If you have any questions about polyurethane, we’re pretty sure you’ll find something helpful on the subject simply by searching this site (that little magnifying glass in the upper right will help you). Key Points: We’ve worked quite a bit with polyurethane, and we’ve written about it many times, answering such questions as how many … Read more

We’ve moved away from wood stains, both water-based and oil-based stains, for our woodworking projects and graduated to drying oils.  We love the look and the feel, and we enjoy the cloth rub to apply it to the wood. There’s nothing wrong with wood stains, and there are projects where we still might turn to … Read more

Littering is a crime and carries a financial penalty if caught.  While that is pretty bad, it’s not as bad as littering with or the improper disposal of oil-soaked rags.  That’s because while the former is an eyesore, a discourtesy, and ugly, the latter is outright dangerous.   Key Points: We’ve even written about the safe … Read more

There are so many ways to finish a woodworking project, and we’ve written about a number of them on these pages, including polyurethane, shellac, beeswax, and more.   The site search feature, that little magnifying glass in the upper right of the page, can be used to find more articles on these and other wood finishes. … Read more

Even we woodworking hobbyists want our projects to have a professional look when we’re done. We want the corners to be square; we want the tables to be level; we want the finish to be even and blotch-free; and we want a smooth surface. Key Points: All of this requires work, but since it’s work, … Read more

We were discussing finishes the other day with a friend, a fellow woodworking hobbyist, and in particular, our current preferences.  We talked about stains and topcoats and such, finish products we’ve both used in the past, and we found we’d both moved from them for our projects. Key Points: He is working on a new … Read more

We know what blotchy means…patchy, covered with blotches, uneven, spotty.  When it comes to woodworking, we know also that we don’t like blotchy finishes.  A spotty and uneven finish on our project almost takes the fun out of woodworking after cutting, sanding, assembling, choosing a stain color, and everything we put into our project. However, … Read more

Painting and landscaping share a common trait for me – each has a meditative quality to the task.  We start with a vision in our head, what we want the room or the yard to look like when the task is completed, however long that may be.  We approach the work with that expectation in … Read more

I was eating a tuna sandwich for lunch this afternoon before returning to work, and I slobbered some of the mayonnaise on my shirt.  Mayonnaise is egg and a lot of oil, along with additives to punch up the flavor. While trying harder to be careful while I was eating, some of the tuna salad … Read more

We deal with sell-buy dates all the time in our homes.  That milk container in the fridge says the sell-buy date was two weeks ago, so we wonder if that means the milk is bad and should be tossed.  What do we do? We smell it first, and if it smells bad or spoiled, we … Read more

Back in the 60s and early 70s, it was tie-dyed tee shirts and bell-bottom jeans, the uniform of the day.  Rock music, Woodstock, the aroma of cannabis in the air, but don’t take the brown acid.  Colorful, each tee was different; the process actually involved tying the shirts in a variety of ways, applying the … Read more

Polycrylic finish can be a good choice for woodworking projects and has several very desirable advantages: What is not to like about any of this? And yet, there may be times when you regret your decision on a finish for that piece of furniture, or the kitchen cabinets, or the new trim you installed in … Read more