Sanding sealer on red-brown cedar

[Dengue]

Hello, I have a board of beautifully grained red cedar with the deep brown reddish colouring, but coarse open grain. The board is mostly brown -red, with the grain pattern shown as much darker brown lines

I am thinking of putting a sanding sealer on it, something like the Feast Watson product, then sanding back and oiling the board with tung oil. I have never used sanding sealer before.

Normally sanding sealer is whitish in colour. Do I need to tint this? I don't want any white stuff in the bottom of the pores of the timber - would ruin the deep red-brown finish

I am open to any ideas and suggestions

[burraboy]

what about using shellac as a sander sealer?

[router]

I think that if you put sanding sealer on as you seem to be suggesting there is a very high chance that you will end up with a finish that will not do the red cedar justice.

I use red cedar quite a bit and use grain filler that is tinted to the darkest colour in the red cedar.

Once the grain filler has been flattened and the board has flat surface and then finished off you should be more than happy with the finish.

I make my own grain filler and therefore i can determine the colour that suits the particular red cedar I am using at the time.

Sanding sealer most certainly has a very good use but on red cedar it will tend to give the red cedar a gray colour.

Good luck

[Dengue]

Thanks for this valuable information, router, much appreciated.

Can I ask how you make your own grain filler, and how do you know when you have sanded it back enough if it is the same colour as the darkest part of the red cedar grain pattern?

What sort of finish do you use with this? Can you still see the grain pattern clearly, or has the cedar gone really dark with the dark grain filler?