Oiling and Waxing

[27saxophone]

All,

May I pick the collective brains of this forum? I've read various threads, and Polisher's Handbook, but I'm still confused.

Milady bought some raw Huon pine coasters as a souvenir of the Great Southern Land, and wants them oiled (to bring out the figuring) and polished (because she does). They are essentially just slices across the grain, bark and all.

My plan (as a total innocent) is to:
- sand with 80/150/320/600 grit
- oil with Feast-Watson Scandinavian oil. 2 coats over 2 days
- sand lightly with 600 grit
- one coat of Sealer
- sand lightly with 800 grit
- Traditional Wax two coats, no sanding between coats.

What are the various thoughts on this process?

Cheers,

[27saxophone]

First thing to note is that there is no point oiling before sanding: the oil doesn't penetrate and the sanding regime above just stripped everything back to bare timber. It was probably character-building.

As was wasting time with glasspaper. Someone pointed out you get what you pay for, and glasspaper is cheap. It lasted about half the life of basic garnet paper, and a third of the life of Aluminium Oxide (and I only used reputable brands).

But it doesn't seem to matter whether you seal before or after oiling. I did six of each, and there is practically no difference in the finish. I had to touch up both with 1200 grit before waxing anyway, to get rid of the oil "waves". Now waiting to see how the trad wax holds.

[RufflyRustic]

.....

- lightly sand with 120/180/320 grit
- one coat of Sealer
- sand lightly with 400 grit
- oil with Feast-Watson Scandinavian oil. 2 coats over 2 days
- sand lightly with 800 grit
- Traditional Wax two coats, no sanding between coats.

Here's what I'd do. Just note that huon is a soft timber and I wouldn't use 80 grit on it, especially as the slices are probably too thin to handle any 'hard' sanding. So easy does it on the sanding, you really just want to take away the nibs and previous sanding marks.

cheers
Wendy