staining

[gdf26562]

My daughter has asked for more furniture, and for some reason it is Pine that she likes, still trying to convince her otherwise, however my question is, when staining pine with 'wattyly craftsman stain' and usually I am happy with the finish it gives, unfortunately on some parts of the timber, the stain appears to blotch (many small imperfections).

Why is this so, and how to fix or compensate it?

Any help would be appreciated

[Sideroxylon]

I got caught with this one very recently. I believe that stain to be a traditional dye type that is not suitable for absorbant timbers. Pine being one of the best soakers around made my handy work look crap. My fix was to change to a darker solvent type and stained again (went from Maple to Blackwood ). I was lucky, it's very hard to spot the balls up. Knowing the calibre of other posters I'm sure you'll get some better fixes.

P.S. I found the warning regarding pine on the back of the can just as I finished. Could be a lesson in that.

[Termite]

You coat first with either Feast Watson Fungishield or U-Beaut Sanding Sealer. The Fungishield takes a fair while to dry whearas the SS dries quickly and also raises the grain. The SS is a very good product but does tend to cut down the absorbsion of the stain a little bit.
Kind regards
Termite

[ubeaut]

Use a turps based stain like Wattyl Colorwood and this won't be a problem. Keep your spirit stain for hardwood.

[j.stevens]

I've had trouble staining pine too. Now for the little I use I found Estapol, either matt for home use or glossy for office furniture

J. Stevens in Brisbane.

[Ian007]

the marks you are refering to is the sap in the pine bleeding thru the stain.
spirit based stains seem to always do this,
while the turps based stuff seems to hide the grain. and i think that the spirit based stuff brings out the grain much more IMHO. but this seems to be the trade off,

however i have had some luck with putting on spirit stain and then reappling it the next day and a bit more if needed for touch ups where it might have blead thru and then spraying on a coat of hicat 50 rather quickly there after. I have overcome these blotches on some rather large pieces of pine furniture.
and they still look good more than 12 months later.

hope that helps

Cheers Ian

[outback]

FWIW, I've had the same problem, my fix.
Put a second coat of stain on, while it's still wet, break out a cloth, metho, and heaps of elbo grease.

Dampen the rag and rub like, well really rub, hard and fast.
A lot of the stain is removed, you end up dyeing the cloth and yer hand with a watered down version of the stain colour.

I stained a pine blnket box with a golden oak colour. After the second coat the box was almost brown, after the rub down it looked all goldeny and oaky looking

[soundman]

I've had good sucess with the wattly spirit stains by staining after sanding sealer. It may not be what some would prefer but I've had good results and the earliest example of this method is now about 6 years old.

apply estipol sanding sealer after sanding thorougly to 180gritt

then sand thru to 240 grit
apply stain over well sanded sealer then overcoat with estipol, poly either clear or tinted. you can get away with staining a little between coats, particularly if you sand thru but you must sand thouroughly ( & carefully )between coats with 240 gritt.
you may not get away with this method with other products, poly might be jam but you can get away with some odd things.

[RETIRED]

I'll add my 2 bobs worth.

We used to stain a lot of pine and found the best way was to absolutely flood it on, have a cup of tea, then remove excess. Leave for 24 hrs and then apply finish.

This was with Wattyl Craftsman stain.

[TassieKiwi]

Pine's open and varied grain needs a different approach. YOu can apply a light coat of shellac first as a sanding sealer, then stain over this. The gel stains from wattyl are ideal for pine as the stain won't 'soak' into the timber.

[gdf26562]

Sorry about my late reply, after two weeks away and fixing the never ending jobs around home, I have finally got into the job, I used the craftsman stain, and as mentioned used heaps of elbow grease with the extra coat of stain, it appeared to remove the 'blotches'

My daughter seemed very happy with the finish, now all I need to do is get her to go for nicer timber.