Finishing Pine

[Mike 55]

Hi Guys,

I'm finishing some 30 year old red pine that has some nice redish/brown stripes. Last time I worked with this I put a conditioner on it to keep it from blotching and I used a stain/poly mix. Looking to do something different. Any ideas?  

Thanks

Mike

[Admiral]

Hi Guys,

I'm finishing some 30 year old red pine that has some nice redish/brown stripes. Last time I worked with this I put a conditioner on it to keep it from blotching and I used a stain/poly mix. Looking to do something different. Any ideas?  

Thanks

Mike

Spit coat of shellac to prevent blotching.

[MsNomer]

Stick with what works. Pine is exquisite when finished right and godawful when finished wrong. MinWax Antique Pine is a good stain choice after the conditioner. Whatever you do, don’t stain so dark that you get reverse grain like they did in the 70’s. That's what gave pine a bad name.

[Cooler]

back in the late 1990s and early 2000s I used to go the national hardware show in Chicago, one of the largest trade shows in the USA. 

Norm Abrams was a celebrity hire at one of the trade booths--as I recall it was the year that DeWalt came out with their first table saw--and I believe he was working at the DeWalt booth. 

He had on display a pine "desk" which was a portable item with a hinged lift top for access to storage.  It was made from pine. 

I asked him about the finish and he said he always used MinWax's oil based Polyshades on pine.  He picked the color he wanted and added as many coats as required to get the depth of color he needed.  If he needed more coats after the color was achieved, then he added clear oil based poly.

I've been using that method ever since.  There is never any blotching and if you pick a good color it will look great.

I don't know why he chose oil based over water based, but perhaps in 1999 the oil based finish was much better than the water based.

[jteneyck]

Hi Guys,

I'm finishing some 30 year old red pine that has some nice redish/brown stripes. Last time I worked with this I put a conditioner on it to keep it from blotching and I used a stain/poly mix. Looking to do something different. Any ideas?  

Thanks

Mike

Why stain it?  Stain on pine almost always leads to disappointment.  Pine looks great when allowed to mellow on its own.  Shellac followed by the clearcoat of your choice would be what I'd do.  If I had to darken it, I'd spray dye or a shellac toner on it and then clearcoat it.  

John

[Mike 55]

Stick with what works.  Pine is exquisite when finished right and godawful when finished wrong.  MinWax Antique Pine is a good stain choice after the conditioner.  Whatever you do, don’t stain so dark that you get reverse grain like they did in the 70’s.  That's what gave pine a bad name.

I have plenty of scraps to test this on. I think I used this on one of my projects with good results. Too long ago combined with a failing memory. 

[Mike 55]

back in the late 1990s and early 2000s I used to go the national hardware show in Chicago, one of the largest trade shows in the USA. 

Norm Abrams was a celebrity hire at one of the trade booths--as I recall it was the year that DeWalt came out with their first table saw--and I believe he was working at the DeWalt booth. 

He had on display a pine "desk" which was a portable item with a hinged lift top for access to storage.  It was made from pine. 

I asked him about the finish and he said he always used MinWax's oil based Polyshades on pine.  He picked the color he wanted and added as many coats as required to get the depth of color he needed.  If he needed more coats after the color was achieved, then he added clear oil based poly.

I've been using that method ever since.  There is never any blotching and if you pick a good color it will look great.

I don't know why he chose oil based over water based, but perhaps in 1999 the oil based finish was much better than the water based.

That is what I used on my last pine project and my brother still loves it. I will give that a try too.

Thanks

Mike

[Mike 55]

Why stain it?  Stain on pine almost always leads to disappointment.  Pine looks great when allowed to mellow on its own.  Shellac followed by the clearcoat of your choice would be what I'd do.  If I had to darken it, I'd spray dye or a shellac toner on it and then clearcoat it.  

John

I've never used shellac but I can give it a try. Can I add a few drops of dye to the shellac to give it some color?

Thanks

Mike

[jteneyck]

I've never used shellac but I can give it a try. Can I add a few drops of dye to the shellac to give it some color?

Thanks

Mike

You can add as little or as much Transtint dye to shellac as you wish, same with WB clearcoats, and change the color a little or completely.  These red cabinets were built with white ash:



But more subtle changes are possible, too.  Here I varied the amount and color of Transtint in both Sealcoat and my WB topcoat to match an existing piece.  



John

[Mike 55]

You can add as little or as much Transtint dye to shellac as you wish, same with WB clearcoats, and change the color a little or completely.  These red cabinets were built with white ash:



But more subtle changes are possible, too.  Here I varied the amount and color of Transtint in both Sealcoat and my WB topcoat to match an existing piece.  



John

John,

That looks way cool! I will go out and buy a can of shellac and start playing around. I like using GF as my top coat. It goes on easy, dries somewhat fast and has a hard finish. Are you saying I could also mix my Trans Tint dye to my GF top coat? I guess that would be like the Min Wax stuff. 

Thanks

Mike