Transtint isn't completely coloring ash

[mikefm101]

Hi,

Am using Transtint for the first time. Is the liquid concentrate diluted in water, applied with a staining pad to ash. Ash was sanded to 180, sponged with water, then sanded to 220. Top coat will be Arm-R-Seal.

If you are wondering I did make a test piece, but this issue did not show up on it. The grain on my test piece was tight enough this did not happen to it.

After two coats I noticed a lot of the fibers were not being colored. The photos below shows it.

[image]



I Googled the issue and one web site turned up this result:

On wood with very pronounced pores like oak and ash, you may notice that the pores do not accept dye and remain light. This is a surface tension phenomenon related to the inherently high surface tension of water.
There are a couple of options in dealing with this.
1- Apply a pigmented stain over the dye
2- Use a paste wood filler to fill and color the pores
3- Seal the wood, then use a colored glaze or stain to color the wood

Frankly, I am not sure which to try, so wondering if there is advice here.

The whole point of using dye was to avoid the look of pigmented stains on ash and oak so not sure how #1 fixes the issue without significantly altering the look.

I have never done options 2 or 3 before in any manner, so those are completely new things to me.

Is a fourth option mixing up more transtint but in denatured alcohol and applying that over the water base dye already there? From what I have read alcohol shouldn't have the surface tension issues water does.

Hope you can help....Mike

[Splinter Puller]

i would have used glue sizing on the ash before final sanding and staining to help control this.

[jteneyck]

Yes, Transtint in DNA, or a water/DNA blend, should get down into those pores. A little more work, but one that looks really good, is to spray a coat of Sealcoat shellac over what you now have and then apply a gel stain or glaze which will just fill the pores if you wipe it well. That's how I put the dark color in the pores of this piece made with white ash.



You can use rattle can shellac if you don't have a spray outfit, or you could use Seal-A-Cell.

John

[Scoony]

I get that all the time with oak, so I seal the dye with clear shellac then use a gel stain. The shellac allows you to wipe most of it off while leaving the stain down in the pores.

Another option that I started using 2 years ago is to use glaze over the dye. After sealing the dye with shellac, I spray SW glaze, allow it to flash off, then simple wipe off. Easier and faster then gel stain. Problem is, that glaze only comes in gal containers.

[mikefm101]

Hi,

I finally sorted this issue out, and posted the finished product in the Woodworking forum in my "New Entertainment Center" thread. Thought I'd share the details here.

I tried diluting Transtint in denatured alcohol, but I was left with much the same result as when diluting with water and also was not really able to match the color well.

I ended up following the guidance from John above and put a layer of shellac followed by a gel stain. The gel is quite a bit darker and far more brown than what I intended, but by that time I was just happy to move this along. Everything including the pores was the same color after the gel stain was applied, and the brown by coincidence looks good with the unstained ash on the rest of the project.

Everything was top coated with four applications of Arm-R-Seal. First time using it but it gets rave reviews here so gave it a try, and was quite happy with its results.

Thanks especially to Scooney and John T. for the help with this.

The photo below is before the Arm-R-Seal was applied. The sheen and overall look evened out tremendously once the Arm-R-Seal went on.

....Mike

[mikefm101]

Hi,

Realized when messing with Photobucket tonight all the image links were removed.

The original two photo's are:




and:


The photo with the final color but no sealer is:



Sorry about that

Mike

[jteneyck]

Mike, glad to see it worked out for you. Got any pics of it all done?

John

[JR1]

Your photos are not found.

Applying Transtint in water directly can give the best results; but on some porous woods a suficant needs to be added. I find that in almost all cases a tone coat of transint in shellac is much easier to use and looks better.

[jteneyck]

JR1, I think you mean surfactant, a fancy name for a wetting agent. The problem is in knowing which one out of the thousands available to use.

John

[mikefm101]

jteneyck said:

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Mike, glad to see it worked out for you. Got any pics of it all done?

John

---

John,

Please use this link to see the finished product.

Will also try tinted shellac. That dresser you posted photo's above of looks really neat. Would love to get results like that.

Mike