Veneered MDF stain/finish

[Rod Smith]

G'day
Making some trophy display boards out of tas oak veneer mdf. Initially I was going to trim them with solid wood, but it would be more efficient to just rout the edges and stain finish over the exposed mdf. The finish appearance needs to resemble blackwood in colour so staining is required. I thought maybe start with some stain in the lacquer (to avoid the mdf absorption problem)and then stain over before finish coats, don't want to obliterate the grain completely though.
Your thought appreciated.
Cheers
Rod

[Shane Watson]

What I do when matching MDF to stained timber is the following.

Seal the MDF with a clear sealer. I use N/C Lacquer. Then for the next coat or two or sometimes three, I add some stain to the lacquer and 'tone' the MDF to the desired darkness. Sealing the MDF first will prevent the absorbtion of the stain into the MDF which prevents that blotchy look caused from uneven stain absorbtion.

Obviously you can use this technique to colour the veneer as well, but if you go to dark you will lose clarity. So it may be better to mask the veneer and satin & finish seperatly and then apply one final coat over the entire piece & it will all blend together. But I don't think you'll have any drama doing it all in one hit.

Anyway, thats how I would approach this task.

HTH!

Cheers!



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Shane Watson..

Combine Love & Skill & You Can Expect A Masterpiece!

[Rod Smith]

Thanks Shane
Thats pretty much what I was thinking.
I just had a bit of a muck around and think that another method might be ok. To stain the pieces of veneer mdf then plane and rout the edges and rub the stain on with a cloth, on a small test piece it seemed much more controlled. Mind you running the router over the stained surface might damage it. Perhaps, stain, 1 or 2 coats, plane and rout the edges, then stain edges, coat the edges then finish the whole sections?
Any particular concoctions you find good for this purpose? I normally use wattyl craftsman stain (oil based) and have added this to the pre cat lacquer with moderate success. Last time I did it though I had a large piece that I had to colour match, it was almost spot on, just a little toning I thought. Wrong, totally stuffed it. Ended up almost looking like paint. Aaaaaaarggh!
Its made me a little paranoid.
Anyway
Thanks
Rod

[Shane Watson]

So long as your run some test pieces and your happy with the end results, it don't really matter how you get there.

I almost exclusivly use NGR stains.

You could try routing the edges then staining them with the rag ( as per your tests today ), then staining the veneer. This would save the possibility of damage to the veneer with the router. If you get any edge stain on the veneer it's an easy process to remove it ( done quickly! ) This would ellimate the double handling. Then the finishing can be done in one process.

Cheers!



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Shane Watson..

Combine Love & Skill & You Can Expect A Masterpiece!

[Rod Smith]

Thanks Shane