What finish should i use

[the dude]

Hi Swingers,
I am building a dinning table from very old slabs of red gum (i think) that were salvaged from an old slab house on my dads farm, i have used PVA as a jointing glue, what should i finish it with? there are a few irregularities due to borers and sap channels or what ever they are, i want to make a feature of these what should i use?

[rsser]

Wet sand with a quality oil finish would be my choice. Rustins or Organoil (the new Organoil DO got a good wrap in a recent Oz woodwork mag comparo.) You could use ubeaut Tradwax over the top which is one of the best wax finishes around IMO.

I did a blackwood table resto a while back and finished with shellac sealer and poly over the top. There were kids around with all the table manners they had ....

The poly scratches easily and can't be repaired; it has to be stripped back. PITA.

[the dude]

Thanks ern,
what should i fill in the holes with, i heard epoxy may not go well with PVA? or have i been given a bum steer

[rsser]

Personal taste I think Dude.

Some guys tint epoxy black for this kind of thing ... do a search on the forum.

I've not heard of PVA/epoxy mix problems but that's just my limited experience.

[the dude]

thanks for your help ern

[Barrie Restall]

I just finished a camphor laurel slab table top, wet sanded to 1200 grit and treated with organoil and trad wax, came up like glass. It had a few knot holes that I filled with embedding resin with red glass inserts. The resin sands up clear. The table will be used on an outdoor covered deck and I expect it will stand up to use pretty well. Bunnings sell the embedding resin.

Your table top would look great with a similar treatment and should stand up to the kids with an occassional buff up.

Put some photos up when your finished it sounds interesting.

Kind regards,

Barrie

[BarFly]

I would finish it with shellac with hardner but unfortunatly this won't stand up too well with kids, so in that case I'd use Rustins Danish Oil. If the joints are a good fit then you shouldn't have any problems with the PVA glue. I've done my worktop this way and has been holding up very well. As for filler I would go with black tinting your epoxy filler to make it a feature.
Lawrence.

[rsser]

Just to be fair to new fangled finishes, also check out Minimax (sp?) wipe-on poly. Lot of folk speak well of it.

[the dude]

Tahnk for all of your ideas, i will post pic's on completion don't hold your breath though you might die.