ageing oregon, naturally

[la Huerta]

evening guys....

you ever noticed that old oregon has a wonderfull brown colour, but once it hits the thicknesser it's back to white, anyone know how to get the brown back naturally, perhaps just leaving it outside or something...

[echnidna]

Takes many years for the color to develop right through the timber.
Sunlight will oxidise the surface color a little bit so maybe an infrared lamp could work

[la Huerta]

hey Bob...i figured it would be some natural process that takes a while, i saw a pic of a oregon table and the colour was more of a light antique colour but the table was'nt stained, maybe they used shellac...

[la Huerta]

i had a look around and found a similar coloured oregon table t what i was talking about any ideas?

[echnidna]

Stain or dye is probably the only practical way to get that sort of color.

[Harry72]

Yep thats no where near the colour of oregon, its more of a dark tan/orange/gold

[la Huerta]

hey guys...

i did some experimenting with tinting shellac with prooftint (oak), built up about 5 or 6 coats and seemed to get pretty much this colur, tinting shellac also does'nt cause the problems as if staining oregon directly...got the odd brush mark showing but i probably could have used a thiner mix, spraying would be awsome, does anyone here spray shellac, do i need expensive equipment and yrs of knowledge...

[ubeaut]

Go to the Sunday trash 'n' treasure market or to a Godfrey's shop and get one of the old electrolux spray guns that used to go with the vacuum cleaner and any old vacuum cleaner that blows and you are ready to start spraying and all for just a few dollars.

Little bit of playing around and you will soon get the hang of spraying the easy and very inexpensive way. Taught many people to spray this way when we had School of Woodcrafts. With a little practise and good technique you can do a very professional job, matter of fact I have had students do a better job this way than many so called professionals do.

Slightly more expensive but still reasonably easy: Buy a Wagner or Krebs airless spray gun kit. I have had both, currently have a Krebs. Use it with the pot on the gun or stick the hose into a tin of paint, shellac, etc and blow out 4 litres in no time for a professional looking finish. Mental note to self: "Get Krebs back from son".

As for the oregon colour. I will bet London to a brick on that the furniture you are talking about was stained using a spray gun. Was out today and saw some 20 or more tables in oregon and baltic ranging in price from $1200 to several thousand $'s all had been stained most were claimed to be natural by sales people. Two actually tried to tell me they were real pear wood and one was convinced that it was actually mahogany (because that's what the manufacturer had on their colour chart, not stained baltic).

Cheers - Neil

[la Huerta]

hey Neil, thanks for the midnight info...i don't know how some salesman can sell a product that he knows nothing about, the pic above is from one of those companies that have 20 or so tables in a showroom. yeh i figured it been stained, i just use oregon and itt does'nt look like that, looks like they have used a light teak/oak sort of colour, i did some experimenting tinting shellac and got the same sort of colour, mind you brushing tinted shellac is no easy task, spraying would be the answer...regarding those airless sprayers and shellac, would i have problems with the sprayer nozle because the shellac dries so fast, how do airless sprayers compare by way of results to say a gmc compresser and spray kit set ups , the only thing i'v ever sprayed is a spraycan so i'm a little challanged in that department...

[ubeaut]

Comparison of Airless and GMC: 6 of 1 half a dozen of the other. Spraying with compressed air or low pressure is more complicated with settings etc than airless. Vacuum cleaner (although sounding extremely amateurish) is by far the easiest.

Cheers - Neil

PS You may find the GMC and other small capacity compressors will struggle to keep up with the spray gun.

[la Huerta]

wel Neil, airless it is...

...only...here do i find one, i have no idea how to use a vac to build one, i'd need a nozzle and the right hose, probablly better to by a waggner or krebs...i'll look around second hand

thanks heaps...

[la Huerta]

hey Neil...ozito have a airless sprayer in bunings, it is one with the container and nozzle all in one, it's about $30 , is this ok to start with?

[echnidna]

why not?
Most of the airless sprayers are much the same!