Culburra Beeswax Furniture Polish

[Repete]

This product is made at Culburra, SA from beeswax, carnauba wax & pure turpentine. Comes in a 150ml jar for $10 + postage. I have been using it for ages & love the finish & the fragrance. I also like to support local manufacturers & they are a pleasure to deal with. Peter

[Xanthorrhoeas]

Hi Peter,

The important thing with furniture wax is to have as little beeswax as possible in the mix. Because beeswax stays soft and sticky it attracts dirt and shows fingermarks. The usefulness of beeswax is solely as a carrier for the hard waxes like Carnauba, which provide a hard, long-lasting protective coating that does not attract dirt or show marks so easily. So, whether Culburra is a wax that I would use would depend very much on the proportions of those waxes. Also, so called 'pure turpentine' or wood turpentine does smell lovely, but it is actually much more toxic to humans than mineral turps.

regards

David

[Repete]

Thanks David, I have done a little googling & found disparate views of Turpentine. Artist's forums talk about toxicity & other sites indicate its medicinal properties, leaving me very confused. I suppose there is turps & then there is turps. If you are happy to, could you please flesh out your knowledge & advise of a quality brand. Peter

[Xanthorrhoeas]

Hi Peter,

Over the years I have used many brands of furniture wax and wax for other collectable/antique items too. My current favourite pale coloured wax is UBeaut Traditional wax (made in Geelong so quite "local" to you). It does have some beeswax in it but also a mixture of the good hard waxes like Carnauba and also, from memory, some polyethylene wax as well as some other undisclosed hard waxes. I have never managed to buy the Traditional wax in a colour though it is advertised as being available in cedar colour.

Antique shops also sell some decent waxes and for a coloured wax I have used Liberon's dark coloured paste wax "Black Bison" brand in the past and been happy with it, but they do not declare the % of different waxes and turps. I use a black wax for polishing dark timbers since any wax left in voids or hollows is less obvious than speckles of light coloured wax. Just be careful to avoid any wax that emphasises Bees Wax or has a high proportion of beeswax. Culburra may be OK - depends on the % of the waxes, but the name makes me wary.

Straight (or almost straight, not sure) polyethylene wax is sold as Renaissance Brand and it is often used by museums and art galleries especially for metal objects etc. but sometimes for furniture. I don't know much about it, but have found it useful for scrimshaw, metal and other collectables. It is white/clear so doesn't affect the colours but provides a protective layer.

For woodturning there is UBeaut's "Shithot" (sorry, not my name - its theirs) wax stick, but I also purchase pure Carnauba wax flakes off eBay and melt them into patty cake papers to have wax blocks to hold against the spinning items before buffing with a small piece rag. if you want to try this use an electric heating unit and make sure to use 3-4 paper patty cake holders together as a single layer softens and spills the hot wax - ouch).

All and any bands of 'natural' turpentine are equally toxic and can cause memory loss. BUT, the quantities in most waxes are very unlikely to harm you, especially if you ensure good ventilation while using them. Artists using oil paints and natural turps are much more at risk as the air around their work can become saturated with the vapour (my wife is an artist).

I am/was a scientist and spent time researching the materials science behind the materials I used but I do not pretend to be an expert. It would be worthwhile looking at Neil Ellis's book 'A Polishers Handbook' (see Forums home page, Special Offers tab) as he explains a lot about such things. (No, I am not associated in any way).

[Repete]

Thanks David, nicely fleshed out & very informative. Regards, Peter

[ubeaut]

Over the years I have used many brands of furniture wax and wax for other collectable/antique items too. My current favourite pale coloured wax is UBeaut Traditional wax (made in Geelong so quite "local" to you). It does have some beeswax in it but also a mixture of the good hard waxes like Carnauba and also, from memory, some polyethylene wax as well as some other undisclosed hard waxes. I have never managed to buy the Traditional wax in a colour though it is advertised as being available in cedar colour.

Traditional was has a small portion of Bees Wax in it to basically give the wax a smoother look it also helps a little with shine, without it the harder waxes tend to look a little like they have curdled. There is no polyurethane wax in the mix.

Other waxes are carnauba, paraffin and ozikerite/cerisin. We use mineral turpentine for health reasons. apart from the fumes causing mental problems it is also a pretty widely held view of many medico's that pure turpentine can cause kidney damage if absorbed through the pores of the skin.

This isn't an ad but Cedar, Walnut and Baltic are available through only a very few selected resellers.


For woodturning there is UBeaut's "Shithot" (sorry, not my name - its theirs) wax stick,
Actually named by original trial people who when asked what they thought about it almost all said it was "Shithot" (pretty rough bunch) it was our first product and the business name was to be called "Shithot Polishes" however I was unable to register that name so it became U-Beaut Polishes but there a plenty of users who still call our polishes "Shithot". A few people say the French pronunciation is Shith-Ho

:U

[Xanthorrhoeas]

Aha, it was paraffin I misremembered, not polyethylene wax. Good wax either way.

It is interesting, we have all been 'educated' that 'natural' is good and synthetic is 'bad', yet 'natural turps' is definitely bad for humans (though it smells good) and synthetic mineral turps is safer.

As a botanist I am always amazed by the 'natural is good' mantra. If anyone has ever experienced Nerium oleander sap in the eyes (i.e flowering Oleanders) they would definitely think otherwise, and might be blind from it. The natural world contains some wonderful and amazing organisms, but some are healthy for humans, some poisonous and some deadly (Taipan venom anyone?). Gives the lie to the 'world was created for humans' idea.