DescentBB

It seems pretty straight forward:
Sand wood. Bevel... sand more...
First I paint a few coats of my stain.
Then I apply a gloss of some sort. And if I want a real high gloss finish I can add 3 more coats. And the gloss should protect against basic wear and tear.

Yes, that how it works.

Varathane

First off Octopus, what species of wood?

woodchip wrote:First off Octopus, what species of wood?

brown.

Pine. Why? Should I go with naturally dark or \"BROWN\" wood?

no .

Some woods react to stain differently and varnish. Generally, the less porous (like oak or Ash) the longer it will take a finish to dry and may require more coats.

Thanks.
I was thinking of buying and sanding a few feet of 2\"x4\" and trying different looks.

Actually Duper, oak and ash are more porus and accept stains readily. Maple and birch OTH are much more dense and staining them requires a different method.

As to pine Octopus, after you sand it to 120 grit you will want to first treat it with a wash coat if you are going to stain it. A wash coat can be bought already mixed or if you are a old dog like me you simply will mix 1 part lacquer to 9 parts lacquer thinner.
Wash coats allow a more uniform absorption of stain and prevents blotchyness in high sap content woods like pine.

Hey thanks a lot woodchip! When ever I'm done with the project I'll post pics

If you want a silky smooth wood surface with depth, try using a finishing scraper after you final sand the bare wood.

http://www.woodworkweb.com/Using-Wood-Scrapers.html

woodchip wrote:Actually Duper, oak and ash are more porus and accept stains readily. Maple and birch OTH are much more dense and staining them requires a different method.

yup, you're right. Those where the first two off the top of my head that are very hard, dense woods. Thanks.

When I was working for a flooring companies I found that the are some pine flooring that would be a problem sanding with a 120 grit paper because of all the resin the pine contains. We would sand to a 60 to 80 grit for neutral. We would go to 100 for a light brown. 120 for darker colors. Buy a lot a paper if you intend to go to 120.

Pine wood also tends to blotch because of the resin in the wood.

It does look really great when done right.

Both done in a neutral stain.

heartwood pine



white pine



Of course furniture is a different animal all together.

tunnelcat wrote:If you want a silky smooth wood surface with depth, try using a finishing scraper after you final sand the bare wood.

http://www.woodworkweb.com/Using-Wood-Scrapers.html

Yes and no. If you are going to use wax or a tung oil rubbed in finish then yes. If you are going to apply a lacquer/catalyzed lacquer/waterbase varnish etc you want the 120 grit "roughness" as to give the finish something to adhere to.

So I got a few things I felt were pretty close to what was initially recommended to me.

For my test run I bought two small cans of:
'Cabot' Gloss Polyurethane
'MINIWAX' Wood finish stain, red mahogany 225

And a 150 grain sand paper. Also I got a mask and eye protection, because I'm a big wuss.

Now I just need to get some free time...

edit:
I'm Octopus FYI.

edit edit:
Also thanks a lot for your advice, everybody. It gives me more confidence moving forward with this highly experimental project. (I'm making a box)

Isaac wrote:
edit:
I'm Octopus FYI.

we've known all along man.

fliptw wrote:we've known all along man.

I'm just trying to take the potential confusion out.
edit:
I'm very happy that lothar was nice enough to get my account unstuck. It runs like new.