An efficient method to color treat/stain a WHOLE lot of little pieces

[bradleyheathhays]

Hello woodworking family. I've been commissioned to make a boatload of these snowflakes for a local horse farm, and I'd like to figure out a way of coloring all these little snowflake pieces without all the effort that would usually go into something like this. Just this one farm is wanting somewhere around a hundred of these things, and it they might get picked by other farms as well. Ideally I'd like to just throw all similarly colored pieces into a 5 gallon bucket of color treatment (I suppose stain) and net them out to let strain and dry. How feasible such a method would be is anyone's guess.

Any suggestions as to how to mass color-treat in a project like this?

 

[jttheclockman]

A couple questions. Are these for outdoors or indoors. That will determine top coat. What did you color what you have there with? What is the wood used? I assume you have jigs made up to cut that many pieces so they are repeatable. They look like very easy cuts. If that is considered one snowflake, that is alot of cutting. Now you asked about staining, that is going to depend on the wood used. Will it take stain well. You can always paint them and do an assembly line thing. Stack a bunch of them up to whatever height you want and place a weight like a brick on top so they do not topple and then spray paint all the sides. Then lay them flat on a board in rows and paint all tops and then flip and paint all bottoms. No matter what you do it will be time consuming but you can get someone to do the painting while you do the cutting. I always hated doing repetition work like that because it gets boring real quick. Dunking is a possibility but have to watch for fingerprints. Saving time will not be any different than the way I said about painting. Plus you will have to set them on a screen to drain back into a pan to capture stain. That can now leave marks. Is that the color to be used or will there be various colors? if so you may have to weigh price of stains over paints. Now there is outdoor stains like used on decks but there is more outdoor colors of paint. Will they need a top coat to keep from fading? some points and questions. I will say this when you get the project done you will not want to see another snowflake in your life. I am betting it will take you longer to assemble than to cut and stain all together. Good luck. Keep tract of your time. Hope you will get paid well. Look simple but there is time there in each one for sure.

Just one other point if using a chop saw or even a tablesaw please make zero clearance fence and throat plates or those will be shooting all over the place.

12 dark grey
12 light grey
3 braces white per unit X 100

You could probably save yourself the coloring of the branches or braces if you use polywood and in fact you can get all colors and not have to stain or paint anything and it will stand forever. It will be more expensive and you need to find a source but it is another option. They make outdoor furniture with it and it is beautiful stuff.

 

[bradleyheathhays]

Thanks for all the good info, Jt. These will be made of cedar and used outside. The goal is to produce these as quickly as possible, so to that end, I'm only planning to give them a single coat, which would have to be the color coat. Two years' usability is the goal, and anything extra is a bonus.

The snowflake picture is from the site I bought the plans from so I'm not entirely sure what colorant was used.

I've built some jigs now and feel like I have a sense of how I can approach the coloring/coating process. These will be made out of 5/8" thick planed (to conserve paint) cedar fence pickets. First, each side of the picket will be painted. Then all the parts will be cut. Afterward, the pieces will be placed into jigs to hold them for the final edge painting. I discovered there's too many issues with the dipping process I was hoping for, including the lines and fingerprints you mention.

I think I was leaning toward stain at first because I wanted strong part adhesion via wood glue, but now that I'm leaning more toward paint, I'm wondering how effective wood glue is at holding painted pieces together. I haven't delved into a project quite like this before.

Various colors... I'll advertise a main version close to the colors used in the picture, but I'm also planning to offer custom colors if someone wants to pay for customization.

Thanks for the warning about repetitious work. I'm sort of built for this kind of repetition. I'm not sure why, but I can do work like this for hours on end and not be too burned out. Nonetheless, I'm sure by the time it's done I'll need a long breather.

And yes, I've got two angle-specific chop saw fences made for cutting the 45 and 50-degree angles this project entails. Nice 80 tooth blade too.

The only question I have left is...what kind of paint should be used, or avoided?

 

[jttheclockman]

Thanks for all the good info, Jt. These will be made of cedar and used outside. The goal is to produce these as quickly as possible, so to that end, I'm only planning to give them a single coat, which would have to be the color coat. Two years' usability is the goal, and anything extra is a bonus.

The snowflake picture is from the site I bought the plans from so I'm not entirely sure what colorant was used.

I've built some jigs now and feel like I have a sense of how I can approach the coloring/coating process. These will be made out of 5/8" thick planed (to conserve paint) cedar fence pickets. First, each side of the picket will be painted. Then all the parts will be cut. Afterward, the pieces will be placed into jigs to hold them for the final edge painting. I discovered there's too many issues with the dipping process I was hoping for, including the lines and fingerprints you mention.

I think I was leaning toward stain at first because I wanted strong part adhesion via wood glue, but now that I'm leaning more toward paint, I'm wondering how effective wood glue is at holding painted pieces together. I haven't delved into a project quite like this before.

Various colors... I'll advertise a main version close to the colors used in the picture, but I'm also planning to offer custom colors if someone wants to pay for customization.

Thanks for the warning about repetitious work. I'm sort of built for this kind of repetition. I'm not sure why, but I can do work like this for hours on end and not be too burned out. Nonetheless, I'm sure by the time it's done I'll need a long breather.

And yes, I've got two angle-specific chop saw fences made for cutting the 45 and 50-degree angles this project entails. Nice 80 tooth blade too.

The only question I have left is...what kind of paint should be used, or avoided?

Painting and gluing never go good together. Maybe a construction adhesive would work well like Liquid Nails or PL 6000. Good luck. As far as paint any outdoor paint will give the life you want. Stain not so much.