Tasmanian Oak To Beech

[EagerBeaver71]

G'day, Complete novice here. I just picked up some Tasmanian Oak which I plan to build a kind of tray to enclose a piece of glass for mixing paint on, basically an artist palette. Ideally I would like the finish to match my easel which is Beech. I realise the grain will be very different to my beech easel but need help choosing a stain/finish to match the tone and colour as closely as possible. Here's my easel:

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Above is a previous attempt at what I'm making but in Pine, I'm not happy with the finish at all. Its blotchy as hell and has shiny & dull patches depending where you are viewing it from!, no idea whats caused this. I applied F&W Timber Primer to the wood before staining it with oil based Walnut Satin Stain&Varnish by BP.



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Top piece is Pine, other two are Tas Oak

I would appreciate greatly anyone steering me in the right direction with this small project.

Thanks,

Sam

[EagerBeaver71]

Anyone got any advice?

[rob streeper]

Never worked with Tasmanian Oak but lightening the wood can be accomplished to a degree with any of several bleaches. Most common here is oxalic acid. Peroxide based products are also available. Making wood darker is relatively easy, but going the other direction is much harder and matching the tone will however be extremely difficult if not impossible. It'd be a lot less work to simply use beech or beech verneer plywood for your palette.

[Arron]

Anyone got any advice?

I think you didn't get any response because most Aussie woodworkers don't do much with Eurpean beech. When we do, its mostly trying to make beech look like something else, not something look like beech.

Anyway, Tassie oak is lighter and bonier then beech. I did a bedroom suite in Tas oak and stained it with Wattyl golden oak at half strength. I guess its pretty much the same as beech now - at least in terms of colour. The grain and overall look is a different story. I found Tassie oak pretty hard to stain if you just want to make it a shade or two darker. You tend to get very dark grain with the solid timber between remaining pale and boney. I'm not in love with the end product.

As you are in Melbourne, I'm thinking why not just make it easier on yourself and buy some Euro beech. Matthews Timber will be able to sell you some.

About the pine - softwoods go blotchy when stained. You need to seal them first - to equalize the porosity. A product used to be available called 'pine sealer' but I think its been discontinued. There are various other sealers available - the timber primer will not do the job.

cheers
Arron

[EagerBeaver71]

I think you didn't get any response because most Aussie woodworkers don't do much with Eurpean beech. When we do, its mostly trying to make beech look like something else, not something look like beech.

Anyway, Tassie oak is lighter and bonier then beech. I did a bedroom suite in Tas oak and stained it with Wattyl golden oak at half strength. I guess its pretty much the same as beech now - at least in terms of colour. The grain and overall look is a different story. I found Tassie oak pretty hard to stain if you just want to make it a shade or two darker. You tend to get very dark grain with the solid timber between remaining pale and boney. I'm not in love with the end product.

As you are in Melbourne, I'm thinking why not just make it easier on yourself and buy some Euro beech. Matthews Timber will be able to sell you some.

About the pine - softwoods go blotchy when stained. You need to seal them first - to equalize the porosity. A product used to be available called 'pine sealer' but I think its been discontinued. There are various other sealers available - the timber primer will not do the job.

cheers
Arron

Hi Arron, Many thanks for the reply mate. Funny enough I picked up some of the Golden Oak in the Minwax range of stains today, and it looks to be pretty damn close to what I'm looking for in tone and colour. I did notice the grain in the Tassie Oak but I think it should be ok. I couldn't for the life of me find anywhere that stocked Beech so I'm very grateful for the Mathews Timber tip off :) .

Just a few questions on staining and sealer. As you know I have some Feast Watson Timber Primer, should I slap some of that on the Tassie Oak before I stain it?, and after the primer dries do I sand the wood before applying the stain or just put the stain on after the primer has dried?. If the Timber Primer is no good for the job on the Tassie oak, what sealer do you recommend?.

Best Regards,

Sam

[Arron]

I think most of the people on this board will tell you shellac is the best sealer to use for every situation and every purpose. I've not tried it under a stain so I cant tell you if its even possible. Can someone advise ?

Anyway, forget about using the primer. I know its hard to sort out the difference between undercoats, primers and sealers but generally:
- primers are focused on helping the topcoat adhere to the substrate
- sealers are focused on sealing chemicals in and moisture out, with a bit of filling too
- undercoats are basically just a cheap way to build up thickness and smoothness

Of course this is reductionist to the point of being nearly useless because of manufacturers blurring the lines between products and marketers using whatever name they think will sell best. Think of it as a starting point.

You don't need a primer because the poly (I'm assuming you are going to top coat with a polyurethane 'varnish') will have no problem sticking to the Tassie oak in this situation.

A sealer wont be much use in this situation either, because Tassie oak doesn't have much that you need to seal in, there isn't much moisture in the indoor situation to seal out, and TO is a fairly dense timber that doesn't really need grain filling beyond what can be done with the first coat of poly appropriately sanded back.

Generally (and possibly excluding shellac) its not wise to seal before staining because you prevent the stain from penetrating the timber. There are exceptions, and I know that many people use a heavily reduced coat of sealer as a 'timber conditioner' before staining.

Therefore I would question the need for any sealer, and if you must stain after sealing then I would use a combined stain/varnish.

Arron

Incidently, you can see why the primer didn't work for you on pine. It's focus on adhesion was not relevant in this case and though it probably has some sealing properties as an added bonus they would be not nearly enough for the demanding job of sealing pine.