Help with prep before staining

[MyWoodenHeart]

Hi everyone, I'm new here and need some help / advice.

I'm in the process of refurbishing a coffee table from the 80's which I purchased from somebody on Gumtree a couple of years ago. The underside has 'Malaysia' stamped on it and it's light coloured wood. The seller actually told me what the wood was but I had completely forgotten. It's very heavy so I'm thinking it's hardwood but of course I'm no expert.

I had sanded it down nice and smooth, then applied my preferred water based stain, wiped, sanded, stained again etc. (followed the tin directions perfectly) until the desired depth of colour. It ended up blotchy and uneven and I was bitterly disappointed!

I know it wasn't the way I was staining/wiping/sanding because as I said, I followed the instructions from the tin, then I experimented again on another piece of wood and it looked wonderful. The table is kind of rough looking and uneven and you can see joins here and there but it actually looks ok unstained.... it's just that the dark stain makes everything stand out 100 fold and looks yukky.

I then researched this problem via google and found that there is a wood conditioner that can be applied to soft or porous wood before staining for a more even finish and found that Masters sell it but because I 'think' mine is hardwood, it may not work well?

So..... does anybody know anything about this stuff and would it be a waste of time in case my table is hardwood? I also found out that I can make my own with 2 parts mineral spirits and 1 part water based varnish but has anybody ever tried this? Also, I have Mirotone (30%) satin finish lacquer (was my father's.... he was a cabinet maker) and was wondering if I could use this instead of the varnish or do you think it's too thin / dry too quickly unlike the thicker varnishes?

Anyway I'm now in the process of sanding it all down to start again. AARRHHGG!!

Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

[mark david]

Hi I handle a fair bit of the Malaysian furniture.
In my experience most of it tends to be made from strips of finger jointed hardwood timber.
I am not sure if your piece is made the same way but this would account for uneveness in the finish.

Due to the randomness of the wood selected it varies a great deal in its absorbency and applying a stain directly to the timber can result in an uneven colour and there is the same problem with low viscosity varnishes also resulting in parts which are very shine to parts which look matt and every possible combination in between.

The only way round this seems to be to spray on a pre-coloured varnish or precolouring a wipe on poly.

Hi everyone, I'm new here and need some help / advice.

I'm in the process of refurbishing a coffee table from the 80's which I purchased from somebody on Gumtree a couple of years ago. The underside has 'Malaysia' stamped on it and it's light coloured wood. The seller actually told me what the wood was but I had completely forgotten. It's very heavy so I'm thinking it's hardwood but of course I'm no expert.

I had sanded it down nice and smooth, then applied my preferred water based stain, wiped, sanded, stained again etc. (followed the tin directions perfectly) until the desired depth of colour. It ended up blotchy and uneven and I was bitterly disappointed!

I know it wasn't the way I was staining/wiping/sanding because as I said, I followed the instructions from the tin, then I experimented again on another piece of wood and it looked wonderful. The table is kind of rough looking and uneven and you can see joins here and there but it actually looks ok unstained.... it's just that the dark stain makes everything stand out 100 fold and looks yukky.

I then researched this problem via google and found that there is a wood conditioner that can be applied to soft or porous wood before staining for a more even finish and found that Masters sell it but because I 'think' mine is hardwood, it may not work well?

So..... does anybody know anything about this stuff and would it be a waste of time in case my table is hardwood? I also found out that I can make my own with 2 parts mineral spirits and 1 part water based varnish but has anybody ever tried this? Also, I have Mirotone (30%) satin finish lacquer (was my father's.... he was a cabinet maker) and was wondering if I could use this instead of the varnish or do you think it's too thin / dry too quickly unlike the thicker varnishes?

Anyway I'm now in the process of sanding it all down to start again. AARRHHGG!!

Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

[MyWoodenHeart]

Hello Mark, many thanks for your reply and I understand what you are saying.
Yes, my coffee table is indeed made of strips of jointed wood and after a while of thinking about it..... I would like to try again with the same staining as I had previously done... as I really don't want to paint the wood, nor use coloured varnish as I'm concerned about over lapping marks (which I really hate).

It's sanded back nicely now, although I sanded it back more than what I did before in case I can get a more even look but I know down deep inside that I'm still going to get the same effect as before (wishful thinking only!).

I think I've made my peace with it and put it down to having a nice, rustic-ish looking coffee table. Life is too short to have perfect things, right? LOL! But what I'd like to do differently is to use steel wool between each stain rather than sandpaper because it seems to sand down too much and exposes some of the raw wood again, even though I'm using a very fine grit and I am quite gentle too. (I'm a woman ).

Hi I handle a fair bit of the Malaysian furniture.
In my experience most of it tends to be made from strips of finger jointed hardwood timber.
I am not sure if your piece is made the same way but this would account for uneveness in the finish.

Due to the randomness of the wood selected it varies a great deal in its absorbency and applying a stain directly to the timber can result in an uneven colour and there is the same problem with low viscosity varnishes also resulting in parts which are very shine to parts which look matt and every possible combination in between.

The only way round this seems to be to spray on a pre-coloured varnish or precolouring a wipe on poly.

[Christos]

One thing you could try is to use shellac as a sealer coat before apply the stain. You can mix your own or purchase one that has been already mixed. One thing to note is to read up on the product info if you are going to purchase one that is pre-mixed.

You could test this on the underside of the table as this is not normally seen.

Just to add,
I have used Ubeaut sanding sealer on some wood turnings before applying a water based dye. Here is the link to the item that I am referring to.

http://www.ubeaut.com.au/sandseal.htm