Best finish to stop timber going dark?

[Dengue]

I have a laminated red cedar box lid that I want to finish, but trying to retain the bare sanded timber appearance.

The attached photo shows the bare sanded lid, plus a test piece which which is finished with Kunos #244 oil. I have tried several finishes, including the ubiquitous wipe on poly, Floorseal and Fine Buffing oil, but the Kunos Oil retains the lightest brownest finish of the lot. The others seem to emphasise the black grain to the detriment of the overall required brown appearance.

Can anyone please suggest a finish that will give the lightest brown colour?

ALSO: Can anyone suggest a timber stringing that will go best around the glueline between the lid and the silky oak box sides? It will be about 3- 4mm wide. Not sure whether to make it out of dark timber, or out of light timber like the Qld Silver Ash

[FenceFurniture]

Traditional wax will do the least darkening I suspect Dengue - but then you have the fingerprint problem (and it is a box, after all)

[node105]

Traditional wax will do the least darkening I suspect Dengue - but then you have the fingerprint problem (and it is a box, after all)

?

Renaissance Wax? resistant to fingerprints, even on blue steel E.C. Emmerich try square blades!

Used by museums around the world (the wax of course, not the try squares)

[LGS]

I have used Trad Wax without finger prints spoiling the finish quite often Dengue. But I ask if you have tried Shellac. I have used Shellac to give light coloured finishes on Red Cedar with excellent results. Failing that, I have also used Hard Burnishing and Wattyl Scandinavian Oils to good effect. The Red Cedar sideboard on the front page of my web address was done this way. I have no problems with stains/liquid or heat on this unit and have not since it was made 5 years ago.

Regards,

Rob

[ubeaut]

Most timbers will darken to some extent when a finish is applied. Some will darken dramatically some hardly at all. To see the lightest it will go, wet it with some water or better still Methylated Spirits.

White shellac should give the lightest colour.

Traditional Wax will darken it initially but will lighten off a little as it fully dries.

That pic of the Kunos Oil looks to be pretty good. Most oils will darken cedar quite considerably some almost to the point of a deep maroon colour, so that's a pretty light finish for an oil.

I would try a coat of U-Beauts' Sanding Sealer followed by light buff off with 800 or 1200 grit abrasive then apply Traditional Wax that should give you the lightest finish when fully dried and buffed off. A couple of coats of Trad Wax will bring up a brighter finish. Then see which is the best for what you want.

Hope this is of some help.

Cheers - Neil

PS Traditional Wax will darkenthe timber somewhat when first applied as will most paste waxes... This is because of the carrier in the wax (turpentine, citrus oil, or oil, etc depending on the manufacturer) will initially darken the timber but will lighten as the carrier dries out of the wood.

[Arron]

ALSO: Can anyone suggest a timber stringing that will go best around the glueline between the lid and the silky oak box sides? It will be about 3- 4mm wide. Not sure whether to make it out of dark timber, or out of light timber like the Qld Silver Ash

consider a very narrow ebony band alongside a slightly wider maple (or preferably sycamore) band. Say, 3mm for the ebony and 6mm for the syc. Like in the attached photo - though reversed.

Why - well because it 'widens' the overly narrow pale outside rim (the silky oak) to bring it into balance with the broad cedar top, while providing lots of lovely high contrast and sharp(visually) edges.

Methodology is to cut and fit the ebony one as a 6mm wide band. Then cut another 6mm rebate which is 3mm over the ebony and 3mm over the cedar, and fit the sycamore into that.

Have lots and lots of dust extraction while sanding to make sure the ebony dust doesn't get into either the sycamore or the cedar.

cheers
Arron
bands.jpg

[Dengue]

Just for confirmation, Arron, you suggest putting a 3mm thin ebony strip on the outside next to the silky oak box side, and put the light coloured 6mm wide strip next to the red cedar?

thanks for this suggestion, looks good

[Arron]

Thats right

Arron

[ian]

I'm not much chop when it comes to colours, but staining the cedar light red or light orange should counteract the darkening when the final finish is applied and leave something very close to the original cedar colour

[Dengue]

hi Gents, I took Arron's advice above, but made a piece of black and white banding 12mm wide so that I would only have to cut the rebate in the lid once. Have made too many mistakes with a lid face down on a router table

The box is pretty large, 500 x 250 x 120 to the recipients specs ( a gift for a neighbour), so I thought a wider inlay band would do, so made banding of 3mm ebony and 9mm African Ash and fitted that as shown below.

In hindsight, I think the Ash part of the banding is too wide, and that Arron's original suggestion of a 9mm wide band would have been better. What do you guys think?

The pics posted below are of the box finished and ready for a few coats of Kunos #244 Oil. The SmartHinge rebates are cut and screws holes drilled, but I have made some inserts of the old "Paddle-pop sticks" to protect the 4 rebates while oiling. Nice snug fit

The box is so large that I made some silky oak handles too. The box sides are 12mm thick Qld silky Oak, and the lid is made from resawn red cedar veneers on a 4mm plywood substrate. The tray is made of Qld Silver Ash with a 4mm plywood base recessed in the bottom. The internals of the box and tray will be lined with dark red pigskin.

P01.jpg Tray, box carcase, lid



P1.jpg P3.jpg


P4.jpgCan you see the borer hole ?
I tried to fill it with epoxy mixed with red cedar dust and some black powder to match the darkest grain, but I think it came out too dark.

[mike100jobstodo]

You may want to use oil based timber finishes or a DWD finish if you want to maintain a colour that is as close as possible to your original wood colour.

Let me know how it goes.

[Dengue]

Excuse my ignorance, mike, but what is a DWD finish, please?

[mike100jobstodo]

No worries. You can find out more about DWD finish here

http://www.intergrain.com.au/consume...t-details/2735

[Arron]

but made a piece of black and white banding 12mm wide so that I would only have to cut the rebate in the lid once. Have made too many mistakes with a lid face down on a router table

This presents a good (although somewhat gratuitous) opportunity to show how I do banding on smaller objects. Having gone down the road of every method from handheld chisels to router tables, this is the method which I've settled on because its the fastest and neatest by far. That's a Dremel trio. They don't seem to be very popular which is a shame because I think if you need a micro-router (and I accept that not many people ever will) then they seem to be the best going. I think its the low centre of gravity combined with the pistol grip that gives you great control. They are so micro that they can only cut about 2mm deep at a pass max - but that's OK because 2mm is a good depth for banding - which I usually make in bulk at about 2mm thickness.

The rest of what you see is just an mdf jig. There's a couple of sliding clamps to hold the object firm, a fence to run along, and those long thin things are sizing blocks to move the object various distances from the fence. A piece I didn't include in the photo is a handled push block which keeps the trio pressed unequivocally up against the fence - no arguments and no following the grain are tolerated.

I initially thought I would want start and stop guides to control the extent of travel, but the Trio is so tractable I never found it necessary, just put a pencil line where you expect to stop and run the trio up to that.

I tried to fill it with epoxy mixed with red cedar dust and some black powder to match the darkest grain, but I think it came out too dark.

Two things which I do when presented with this problem is change the shape from circular to tear-drop (looks more natural, more like a knot), and fill with a partially blended mix of two colours of Timbermate (ie a swirl of brown inside the black). Always a problem though, never really solvable.

Otherwise, a great job. Well done.

cheers
Arron
bandingjig.jpg