Here is the chess board I made for my son for Christmas. The plans came from Woodsmith magazine. I had to make 2 tops since I knew to pay attention to grain direction and square color but of course I didn't. The first top with the white square at bottom right had you playing against the grain. I didn't like that so I made a second top. The first top I boarded with cherry and used at a test piece for finishing. That was only partially helpful since I had the hardest time acquiring semi-gloss HP poly. I was ordering some things form Amazon so I was lazy and ordered a qt. Well it was good they had sealed the can in a plastic bag since it arrived dented and leaking. I sent it back and re-ordered it. This time it didn't even make it to my door before the shipper sent it back because it was damaged. Then I broke down and drove the 25min to Woodcraft and they only had one pint can left. I got that hoping it would be enough. I sprayed the spare top and felt I might not quite have enough to do the final project. Woodcraft was the only place I could source the small drawer pulls so back to Woodcraft I went. Of course now they are fully stocked with all sizes of semi-gloss so I picked up a qt. This is where having a test piece fell apart. The pint can was 56 sec in a #4 ford cup and the qt was 108 sec. General finishes used to list it around 30 sec. I just noticed they stopped listing viscosity in sec and now they use cPs and a generic high, medium, low. I have also seen this large variation in viscosity with their Enduro-Var. I am starting to wonder about their quality control.
Any way this came out nice. It is maple, walnut and elm burl. The squares have chamfered edges which give the top and nice 3D look. The squares have blonde shellac then HP poly. The rest of the piece is ruby shellac with HP poly.
The dividers in the drawer are maple and unfinished. Should I leave them unfinished or spray them with some blonde shellac?
Hopefully the pics come through now.
Any way this came out nice. It is maple, walnut and elm burl. The squares have chamfered edges which give the top and nice 3D look. The squares have blonde shellac then HP poly. The rest of the piece is ruby shellac with HP poly.
The dividers in the drawer are maple and unfinished. Should I leave them unfinished or spray them with some blonde shellac?
Hopefully the pics come through now.
