More coatings?

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Woodchipper

Woodchipper

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Mar 15, 2017
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Cleveland, TN
Doing a pen with a Jim Beam blank which is oak. I got it sanded down good to 600 grit. Applied six coats of BLO and thin CA each and polished with Hutt polish. Still have some pits in the finish due to the coarse grain. More BLO and thin CA? Don't have medium CA as it discolored and spoiled if CA can spoil. Have thick CA but it's like cold molasses. Holding off anything else pending your responses.
 
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Us the thin CA to fill if that's all you've got. If you already have CA on the pen the BLO is probably not going to build over it.

I do a lot of coarse grain pens and I usually use a first coat of thin to seal things up and then lay in the medium
 
When you have space in the wood grain for CA glue to fall into, you'll need more coats to get an even, uniform surface.

It's probably faster to use something like a cellulose sanding sealer (I use Mylands) prior to starting a CA finish if you're using a wood with grain as open as oak.
 
Here is my solution for open grain wood. I use a slurry made from sanding dust and thin CA. I sand with 220 catching sanding dust on the sandpaper. Sanding at this step is done on the bottom side of the blank. Drizzle thin CA over the top of the blank with the lathe on a slow speed. (not sure of the actual rpm's) The CA will mix with the sanding dust forming a slurry which fills in the open grain. I now us a scraper or skew and remove the cured slurry back down to the blank's surface. Now I sand and apply the CA finish as usual.

The process is included in an article in the library in the finishes collection: CA finish...One man's opinion or here is a link to my article.
https://tinyurl.com/4vsx879p (I hope it works)
Do a good turn daily!
Don
 
Don, I took the liberty to print the link for future reference when I can take time to read and digest the information. Thanks for taking time to write it.
One good turn deserves another.
 
Sometimes when I just feel like doing something different, I use Zinsser Clear Shellac. Shellac dries fairly quick and it does a great job filing and sealing porous wood, at least it does for me. And after it cures, it allows other finishes on top quite well.
 
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