Picture of Medium Sheen Waterlox on Oak
Here is a picture of how shiny the "medium sheen" Original Waterlox turned out on my white oak woodwork. I have multiple coats of the dewaxed, garnet shellac first to build up the color and then 3 hand rubbed coats of the Waterlox Original. It was still too shiny, I thought. So I have added another coat with some flattening agent added to it that I haven't taken a picture of yet. I'll take pictures of the finished product when I'm done.
Labels: medium sheen, oak, original, restore, shellac, waterlox, woodwork
posted by Erie's Argonaut at 2/03/2007 01:33:00 AM
5 Comments:
What a beautiful color!
I have a 100 year old house that has Mahogany woodwork throughout. I am trying to replicate the finish which was shellac. I am not sure if is was tinted or garnet or just age. It has a very deep red wine look to it, similar to your oak. Can you please elaborate on the process you did to create the color and finish of your wood work? How many coats of garnet shellac? Where is the garnet from ( supplier)? Did you strip down to bare oak? Any help that you can give would be appreciated. Thanks
Garnet shellac has a purplish or burgandy undertone to it. But I found the color doesn't show up, really, until you have several coats on the wood. The first few layers were disappointing the first time I used it. It is very glossy so you'll need to fill the pores of your wood (mahogany) or it will look terrible. Shellac is hard to master, for me anyway,and I'm still no pro, it's hit and miss but I keep doing it over until I get it pretty. There are a lot of internet sites that will help. I used www.woodcentral.com message board when I was learning. When you have a question you just ask and several wood finishers will answer. I bought books, checked out books from the library to learn all I could because I had so many failures! There is nothing prettier than the look of garnet shellac when it turns out. I'll elaborate soon on my method to get my results. I'll try and make a video to show how I do it and post it on this blog in the weeks ahead.
Glad to have found your site. We are redoing our 1906 house that has shellacked wood throughout. You are right that shellac is tricky to apply. Do you brush it on our wipe it on? What cut do you use. We are applying shellac to new fir cabinets in the kitchen and we were thinking of applying Waterlox over the shellac. How is your shellac/waterlox combo holding up? Did the sheen go down? Did you prep the shellac at all before you applied the waterlox? trisha
I have tried brushing, padding and spraying shellac on my woodwork. I'm no expert. I learn by doing and making lots of mistakes. I still goof but I'm pretty good at fixing it now. Brushing is the hardest, I think. Most of the woodwork is vertical and it wants to drip and run. If you dripped and it already starts to dry you just have to leave it until it is totallly dry before you sand it out. Shellac has a strange tendancy to crawl out of the pores as it dries and makes tiny ridges on each side of the pore. It has a surface tension when drying. Fill the pores if you use oak or you'll have so much frustration, fir wouldn't have much problem I don't think. Padding does such a better job, less drips but takes longer to build up the coats. Spraying is the easiest. I used a HVLP sprayer. But I found everything in my house covered with fine shellac dust after the spraying. It takes a lot of test trial and errors to get the mix just right but then it goes on good. I used dewaxed shellac and put Waterlox Original Satin Sheen over it. I used 0000 steel wool on the shellac to cut the sheen and make a fine scratch pattern and then cleaned it good with mineral spirits to get the steel wool off. I vacuumed it, too to make sure it was dust free. Then I wiped on the Waterlox. I put on 3 coats, I think, waiting a day between each one. It takes a lot longer than shellac to dry to the touch so it levels out better. I found the satin Waterlox a bit too shiny for my taste and added a little bit of Shellac Flatt to it to cut the shine. I don't know if that product is still available but there are other brands. You can use extra fine steel wool pads to make it more of a matte finish when it is fully cured. I love the Waterlox. It seems to be more durable. I put it as a top coat on my oak dining table over a shellac finish and it isn't as easy to make a mark on it. I don't know what the long-term results will be. My best results with shellac is the 2-pound cut. I thin it more when spraying. That depends on the temperature and the type of sprayer.
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