Further Trials on Fast, Low-VOC Grain Filling, Burnishing

[C. in Indy]

A couple of years ago here I posted a few experiments where wood burnishing had some attractive benefits.   In and after that process, I acquired a really tight-bound polissoir, and also some of Don Williams' solid and liquid waxes.

I consider it a fortunate thing that one of the more impressive and easier woods to prepare this way is plain oak.  I have a few projects and tools that always live indoors, and they have only beeswax on raw oak, and I love them.

I have other woods which really are pretty but clearly need some improved grain filling.  The example below will be Kentucky Coffeetree.  I had a nice quartersawn piece and I experimented a lot in the morning, really to come away frustrated.  I had done burnishing, rubbing wax in, melting and pouring wax in, and even running it on a hot buffing wheel charged with wax.  I didn't think the resulting outcome was worth the efforts.

Later in the day, I pondered it, and I thought maybe the 1st polissoir step was making the grain-opening "furrows" distort.  That is, the grain "furrow" was having a partial "roof" extended over it by the mechanical burnishing actions.   Wax (molten or friction-flowed) would maybe be viscous enough not to get through the 'hole in the roof' to be efficiently filled into the 'furrow'.

So I did a new experiment / finish schedule.  I did a real nice planing of the surface, and that stopped my mechanical work for the time.  Next I melted and flowed-in a good amount of wax (I did brown beeswax first, and then overcoated and reflowed some of Don's shellac wax over that, mixing as best I could with a small heating iron).  After this, I scraped down the plank with a simple sharp-cut fir board-edge to remove excess wax.  Then I finally worked it with the polissoir and finishing cloth.

This seemed to help!   I have placed comparative pictures below.   This is all just waxes, with no shellac.  

First two pic's are from the basement shop, where the overhead lights are typically pretty cruel to scratches.  These are two sides of the same board:

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Last pic is from natural light upstairs, where I cut the board so a direct comparison would be visible:

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[wmickley]

I use pieces of walnut or cherry for burnishing. Andre Roubo recommends walnut for a burnisher (brunissoir).

Roubo uses a polissoir for applying wax. He does not mention burnishing in reference to the polissoir.  Roubo uses rush for making his tool, not broom corn. Rush is softer and much more pliant. 

Rush grows at the edges of ponds and wet places and it resembles an overgrown chives plant. The French word for rush is Jonc; the Latin or scientific name is Juncus.

[C. in Indy]

Don Williams has had the juncus -vs- broomstick-hedge polissoir correction sent to him by Yannick Chastang, famous conservator, as well.  He has produced tools with both materials now.

For my own case, using Kentucky Coffeetree wood, which is harder than ash and much more coarse-finished (especially when quartersawn), and wasn't growing in the Old Kentucky Home region of France, I wanted to see for myself what worked well for grain-filling and beauty and didn't stink up the house with solvents, even if they be historic and nature-derived like turpentine.  I used an AC-powered small iron for wax-melting, which derives obliviously from the historic DC-vs-AC battles of Edison vs. Steinmetz.

There are other cases where I'm looking for a completely different outcome.  E.g., some very old pine wood I have is beautiful, but when handplaned the attractive differences between growth-rings go away.  In this case a vigorous burnishing brings back some of those differences.

[C. in Indy]

And, there's more!

As they used to say in show-business,  introducing the man who needs no introduction....

The Oak which Needs No Oak Grain-Filling...   Holm Oak


I just got this plane off the auction site.  It needed a fair amount of work because the well-aged body and blade were almost in a "skew" setup rather than a standard plane setup.  I did lots of re-grind on the blade and selective truing on the base.   I also had to augment the wedge-piece with lateral filler wood.   All is well, now!  Base is burnishing up nicely, with that unique holm-oak grain:

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[Scoony]

That is a wild look plane.