Finish Question - Need to Preserve the Contrast in the Figure

Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
d_bondi

d_bondi

Member
Joined
Jun 19, 2023
Messages
1,475
Location
Utah
Hello Everyone,

I am making a sleeved (ebonite) kitless pen with a nicely figured piece of Mun Ebony Burl. I would really like to keep the contrast between the light and dark in the figure. I use CA for my finish on 98% of my pens and plan to do so on this one as well. The problem is that CA darkens the wood, which many times is fine, but in this case it has the effect of darkening everything and muting the contrast of the light and dark.

Here is a picture of the work in progress with no finish on it. You can clearly see the great light and dark differences in the figure.

79AF020A-0A4D-4C82-B53F-7A836EE5DFE1_1_102_a.jpeg

Here is a photo of this same piece of wood, earlier in the process and before shaping. It has a single coat of ultra thin CA (GluBoost) to protect the wood. See how the CA darkened everything and kind of ruins all the great contrast in the figure?

B2A52392-426F-49D1-BDB6-C4CED96858A3_1_102_a.jpeg

So here is the ask... is there anything that I can use to seal the wood to preserve the great contrast of color in the figure that won't darken it and that I can still put a GluBoost CA finish on?

Thanks in advance!

David
 
Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
Not the same but maybe worth a try.
I was finishing pens made with maple and I got "annoyed" by the appearance after applying CA finish, basically the light color was turning into a mid-brown. I ended up applying a first coat of Rubio Monocoat White 5% or Cotton White (can't remember which I used) before CA and no color change of the maple! Haven't had a chance to try on other woods yet.
 
Since I've been mostly working with other materials and GluBoost or CA, I haven't experienced this, but I recently did a heavily burled table slab with Rubio Monocoat and I can say that the contrast in the wood held up just fine. One thing I did prior to the Monocoat was to use a wood hardener called PC Petrifier on the slab as parts of it were a bit punky, effectively sealing off the wood so that may have stopped it from darkening - and the PC Petrifier did not change the wood tone at all. The PC Petrifier is water based and easily applied. It's made local to me, but I think Home Depot and Amazon carry it. PC Petrifier Maybe if you have some other pieces of the burl, do some tests to see if this might work. They advertise it to turners who work with spalted wood by us and a few use it, but it's not a food safe solution, so not viable for bowls but it is nontoxic, so no issue with pens (or my table).

My thoughts would be to try the wood hardener and then the Rubio and see what happens. It is a shame to see the amazing color of that wood go to sad brown!!

Kevin
 
I've not been in the exact situation you are facing, but in general I've found water based finishes to cause less darkening than the oil based ones, and lacquer (as opposed to shellac). Things I've used include Minwax Poly-acrylate finish, rattle-can lacquer, and Hydrocote water-based lacquer.

I have a stick of ebony that is "black and white" (not sure if it's mun ebony or some other kind), I'll sand the stick and test the Hydrocote and the rattle-can and get back to you. Might take a couple of days as we have some stuff scheduled.
 
My first thought was lacquer or shellac, let dry and cure, then hit it with GluBoost. Do you have a small piece you can experiment with?
 
I've been trying the U-Beaut finishes lately. They have a white shellac that is used on lighter colored woods so as to not darken the woods.
This video describes all their finishes/polishes. I got the EEE-Ultra shine and Shella wax from Amazon (they drop shipped from PSI on one of the items).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom