Snooker table restoration

[mikebr]

Hi, I have a 50 year old mahogany snooker table with turned legs, someone has restored this in the past at some time and the table has a high gloss finish... at least it did before I removed the finish with a varnish remover.

The table was a dark mahogany brown colour before I removed the 'varnish' finish, similar to the colour when dabbing a wet finger onto the natural wool after the varnish has been removed. The finish looked like a high gloss varnish over mahogany and now after removing the finish you can see where they have set in some pieces of timber to repair the cushions and even used a light coloured filler on a couple of cracks that are on a damaged leg, this was not noticeable before I removed the varnish... or maybe I just didn't look close enough! but it certainly was not obvious as it looked just as a varnish over the 'I think' mahogany. I also see the original wood on the cushions is different shades, looks like mahogany and then sapeli in that the facing is mahogany coloured while the edging is a much lighter mahogany colour but I beleive mahogany can be different shades like that. I want to revarnish this to a high gloss, now I can spray and paint but I have never really taken on a restoration of a varnished item before.

So onto my questions....

I obviously want this to be an even colour all over, should I stain the wood before varnishing or use a varnish that has a colour in it?

Should I use a varnish or should it be a lacquer?

Should I brush or spray the finish on?

Sorry for all the questions but this is a really nice table, or it will hopefully be when varnished and I don't want to make any silly mistakes like using a varnish rather than a lacquer or staining the wood when I should use a coloured varnish.

I am going down to the lock up where I have the stripped legs and cushions, I will take a couple of photos and post them this afternoon.

Many thanks in advance.

[mikebr]

Here are a couple of images of two legs and a couple of cushions:

You can see the filler used on one leg, on the image with two legs I have dabbed a wet finger on the wood so you can see the colour.

On the cushions there is a veneer used for the facing, whoever restored this table before made a right mess as they tried to plane the venerred surface and so ruined it (you can see this on the 2nd and 5th images and this also shows the original colour), they then used a thin mahogany finished ply screwed on to cover that mess up. I never removed the varnish from that face to save work as I have a carpenter who will run the cushions through a saw or router and skim the veneered face off, we will then either glue on a new veneer or a 6 mm facing in sapily (which I have) or mahogany if I can get it.

BTW, the wood has come up really well, I can't believe how smooth it is 'especially on the legs' after using the varnish remover.

Again, thanks in advance.

[munruben]

Quite a project you have chosen to take on but very challenging and satisfying when completed. I think maybe the filler on the leg would probably have been visible had you examined it closely.
Varnishing it so the filler doesn't show, may prove to be challenging. Timber has a habit of giving up all its secrets when a finish is applied hence the need for first class preparation prior to applying a finish. Nevertheless, I am sure those on here with a lot more experience than I will be able to offer some valuable advice.
Personally I feel to make the filler less noticeable, a stain or varnish/stain may be the way to go. Maybe you could remove the old filler and apply something that is not going to show itself so noticeably.
Will be interesting to see how this works out for you.

[mikebr]

Quite a project you have chosen to take on but very challenging and satisfying when completed. I think maybe the filler on the leg would probably have been visible had you examined it closely.
Varnishing it so the filler doesn't show, may prove to be challenging. Timber has a habit of giving up all its secrets when a finish is applied hence the need for first class preparation prior to applying a finish. Nevertheless, I am sure those on here with a lot more experience than I will be able to offer some valuable advice.
Personally I feel to make the filler less noticeable, a stain or varnish/stain may be the way to go. Maybe you could remove the old filler and apply something that is not going to show itself so noticeably.
Will be interesting to see how this works out for you.

Yes it probably is quite a project but one I am looking forward to see how it turns out. I am fairly busy at the moment so I won't get to the paint store until some time next week and then maybe they can give some advice as to the best way to go at this, stain and varnish or varnish with colour.

Thanks for the advice on the filler, I don't want to do any damage to the surrounding wood although maybe with a small rasping bit in a Dremmel I might get it out deep enough to take a filler the same colour of the wood... feels like that might work actually.
I managed to find a piece of Mahogany that I can use to cut some facing slats out of for facing the cushions, to cover the face where whoever tried to restore it in the past screwed up the veneer... so far so good. :)

[munruben]

Good luck with it, keep us informed and more pics as you go along..