Posted on 08/15/2009 12:48:35 PM PDT by djf
Ok. I bought an end table at a garage sale the other day for a couple bucks. It needs some TLC, and but I figured I could use it as is now and do some minor touch-up at some later date.
Just out of curiosity, I took my penknife and scraped of some of the old finish.... man oh man is this thing beautiful!
Either cherry wood itself or some kind of eastern hardwood cherry stained, there are no deep gouges in it, nothing wrong at all except the old shellac (which comes off in big flakes at times!).
But! There are some fairly intricate places where the wood has been carved in to these long lines of like bumps or buttons, and I'm a bit unsure how to handle them.
I've done a fair amount of woodwork before, and my usual procedure is to scrape off the old finish, sand with a 200 grit or so, then sand with 0000 steel wool. Usually I use Minwax polycrylic finish, which I think would do an excellent job here, but I gotta get the old stuff off.
Help!!
Woodworker? I’m not a pr0n star, sorry. :O)
Could you snap a few pix and put ‘em up on a website where we might get a look-see?
You better make sure it isn’t an Antique before you start stripping it.
It can be worth a lot of money even if the finish is coming off.
toothbrush
I do however know how to handle my lumber.
There are several safe strippers on the market that would make your job easier. The carved areas will still take time scraping though. Good Luck.
Patience’s and persistence
Pictures would help.
Chemical stripper. You can find a local place that does archtectural stripping of doors, etc, and they can probably dunk the whole thing and save you a lot of time. Or you can chemical strip yourself, but it might be tedious if it is heavily carved. I would avoid anything that scrapes or sands, except for the last bit when prepping for the new finish. You could easily ruin the whole thing by scraping. By the way, are you sure it is not an antique with some value?
In the works...
You want to be careful from a few viewpoints. First, on a lot of old pieces the “grain” is actually printed on — yup, printed. If you aren’t careful you can remove the printed grain only to discover that what’s underneath isn’t nearly so beautiful.
The second reason to be careful is patina. Over the years wood develops a beautiful patina. That’s why antiques look so much better than modern pieces. Unfortunately patina can be destroyed by most chemical strippers, as well as by vigorous sanding.
OK, so with those caveats out of the way.
If what is coming off is flaky, I’d agree it is likely shellac. Shellac dissolves in alcohol — which is how you can test to see what it is. If the flakes dissolve in alcohol you are dealing with shellac: you can carefully test a hidden piece of the table to see if alcohol removes the finish WITHOUT damaging the patina. If it does, that would be what to use: a stiff brush (of the sort you’d use for oil painting) and pure alcohol, scrub it out thoroughly.
To re-finish, I’d go for shellac again. If you’re dealing with an older piece, best to keep the finish the same as the original. Less likely to encounter compatibility problems.
Those are my $0.02 worth.
Get thee to a hardware store.....this situation is exactly why God made wood finish stripping agents. Use an oil or water based product, your choice. Follow the directions, and Voila! Bob’s Your Uncle!
Krylon covers everything!
Stiff, flat top toothbrushes and dental picks are my favorites for cleaning up carved, recessed or other irregular surfaces prior to refinishing. There are several very good, very safe strippers on the market, as well. Those will help.
As far as the ‘antique’ value. In over 30 years of working with this stuff, I’ve found that the higher value of antiques accrues to those pieces still in excellent to pristine, ‘like new’ condition. If you have a piece that is already devalued by virtue of prior refinishing, the value is not likely to be further decreased by refinishing, again.
Have at it.
You’ll probably ping everyone who’s posted on this thread when you’ve done that, right?
I don’t know, wouldn’t strippers (safe or not) just be a distraction from the job at hand?
endangered old growth?
Safe strippers? Every stripper I’ve ever met has been very unsafe indeed.
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