Replies

1. 
   pins | Jul 16, 2006 10:49pm | #1

   I like to use an amber shellac, I think it brings out the details in the wood better than anything else. Then you can finish over that with anything you want. Behr's Clear Lac from Home Depot is a good choice IMHO for a medium duty finish and it drys very quickly which I like a lot.

   John

1. 
   rog | Jul 16, 2006 11:17pm | #2

   Thanks John

   Do I have to do anything special in the surface preparation?  Like raising the grain or filling the grain. The tops I saw in New England were very light and the curls and eyes in the maple grain were very clear and distinct. I want to use cherry on the table base in contrast and also am making the base for a coffee grinder from Lee Valley. Want to make the base out of Oak and the drawer out of curly maple.

   Roger

   Roger

1. 
   pins | Jul 16, 2006 11:28pm | #3

   Pleasure is mine,After glue up I level tops with 120grit on a 6" Porter Cable 7336 because it's very aggressive without leaving a lot of gouges in the top. Then I sand again with 120 on a DeWalt 5", 150 on the same and 180 on the same. I use three sanders dedicated with those grits.Then I apply shellac, (there is no need to raise the grain before shellac, only water based finishes or water based analine dyes), let it dry, sand very lightly with white 220 no-load and them apply as many coats of finish as I think I need, and I like thin coats. The in between coats and the final sanding is with 320 white no-load then I wipe on a final coat of yhin finish using new, but twice laundered, flannel that I by at WalMart.Then I lightly rub out with 0000 steel wool and then rub out the finish with rottenstone using 50/50 parafin oil and mineral spirits. If I have had to lean on the steel wool to much I will use fine pumice and then the rottenstone.John

2. 
   BruceS | Jul 17, 2006 04:27pm | #6

   Roger,  Shoot me if you will, But personally I don't like the look of Oak and curly maple together, Flat sawn oak/Qtr. sawn drawer would be nice.  Curly maple/cherry  or curly maple/walnut would be my suggestion.  Just a matter personal taste.Work Safe,  Count to 10 when your done for the day !!

   Bruce S. 

    

2. 
   BossCrunk | Jul 17, 2006 02:53pm | #4

   If you want that very clear, white look for Pete's sake don't use amber shellac as has been suggested. Use ultra-blond shellac if you use shellac at all.

1. 
   pins | Jul 17, 2006 07:52pm | #8

   With the possible exception of some odd-ball producers there is no 'Amber' shellac. I was referring to the color of the shellac as it appears in a clear jar. Below find descriptions of the generally available grades of shellac compliments of Jim McNamara at 'The Woodworker's Gazette.'Seedlac - dark brown
   Buttonlac - brown to reddish brown
   Garnetlac or Ruby shellac - light reddish brown
   Orange shellac - carrot orange to amber
   Lemon shellac - pale yellow to orange yellow
   Blonde shellac - slight amber tingeNote: the colors of these grades vary from supplier to supplier. The color strength per coat is not that great, so several coats are almost always needed - an advantage.(To those you could ad "Super Blonde")Note the 'slight amber tinge' of blonde shellac and that's what I was speaking of. If one wants the 'curly' in the maple to stand out that's the way to do it and blonde shellac, in my case it was Park's, when
   decanted to a glass jar and allowed to settle the wax will fall to the bottom and the clear will float on top. The float is still amber and dark in the jar but not dark on the curly maple. I use analine dyes a lot and I can tell you that Lockwood's Early American Maple dyes virtually obliterate the fine detail in curly and curly spalted maple.So. Apparently I concerned my post with the 'curly maple' part and ignored the 'white' part because it never ocurred to me that anybody would want to make curly maple white.Hope I cleared that up.John

1. 
   BossCrunk | Jul 17, 2006 10:00pm | #9

   I'm aware of that. I chose not to correct you, but you seem to want to correct me for not having corrected you.

   You used the term 'amber' shellac in your original response:

   I like to use an amber shellac, I think it brings out the details in the wood better than anything else.

   Any confusion about the grades of shellac is of your own making.

   I suppose I should have put the term 'amber' in quotations but I wasn't feeling particularly confrontational when I posted my response.

   Super-blonde is used when the desire is to impart the least amount of color (for a shellac), for whatever reason, even bad taste. That's the salient point, which I made,  taking the original poster's question at face value.

   I assume the original poster wants to pop the figure with the least amount of color imparted.  If he had something else in mind then I would suggest that he pop the curl with oil and then shellac over the cured oil surface, again with super-blonde if that's the look he's going after.

   There's no accounting for taste and I assume the poster is comfortable with the look he wants but needs advice on products that can be used to achieve that look. 

   I've used shellac in all its interations (other than canned) on more occassions than I care to remember. 

   Edited 7/18/2006 7:38 am ET by BossCrunk

2. 
   SteveSchoene | Jul 18, 2006 12:19am | #10

   The most widely available shellac in the US is in fact labeled Amber, even though its commodity trade name is different.  This, of course, is the liquid shellac marketed by Zinsser and available universally.  (It used to be named Orange, less elegant for marketing I suppose.)  The counterpart is Clear the liquid bleached shellac also produced by Zinsser. This used to be named White, but that was confused with the pigmented stain blocking shellac.  Bleached shellac is not the same thing as Blonde (super or ultra etc.)  The blonde shellacs just have much of the orange dye washed out, where bleached shellac is actually chemically bleached with a chlorine bleach.  Its not available at retail as flakes because these have a very very short shelf life.  The resulting product suffers some durability issues compared to unbleached shellacs.

   I prefer to mix my own flakes, to insure freshness, and to know what solvent I am using. 

3. 
   9619 | Jul 17, 2006 03:29pm | #5

   Rog,
   Sometimes it is hard to envision what someone else is trying to do. I like to use curley maple with analine dye stain and then polyurathane, but I am not after the "almost bleached" effect that you are after. Boss Crunk was obviously right in advising you to stay away from amber shellac if you want a very light effect. That will make the curlyness more pronounced. I guess that what I don't understand is why anyone would use curly maple if they wanted to have a a bleached effect. So, if you would, please post a photo of your finished product when you are done so that I, and others, can find out what you were really after. For a very light effect on maple, I would just use a straight grained maple with almost no figure. Besides, it would be cheaper. But I am sure that there is something that I am not understanding about what you are trying to do.
   Enjoy,
   Mel

4. 
   highfigh | Jul 17, 2006 05:18pm | #7

   If the maple looked abnormally white, it may have been washed with a very thin white paint. Go 2:1 mix, thinner to paint and thin it more if needed to get the color you want. After it's totally dry, try the Zinsser shellac sanding sealer (it's dewaxed) and a non-yellowing finish over that. Water based poly and, IIRC, Sherwin Williams CAB lacquer and water-white conversion varnish don't yellow. If you want it to stay light with no yellowing, go to a good paint store and ask what they have.

   Amber will never look white. It's not a look I generally like (I think it may be from seeing it on the drafting tables in school for so many years) but I got a workbench that was in Boy's Tech here in Milwaukee and it has amber on it. I like it on that and it does bring out the grain well.

   "I cut this piece four times and it's still too short."

   
   

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   Edited 7/17/2006 10:23 am by highfigh