This will be a counter top in a guest bedroom. Will have small coffee maker, desk area with storage underneath. The plywood edges will be trimmed with some left-over maple flooring milled to suitable dimensions. The flooring has been sitting for 6 years in a dry storage shed, and was sealed on both sides with oil-based sanding sealer.
My thought is to use the same finishing steps over all that were successful for oak plywood jamb extensions and oak trim in same room…namely wax-free shellac initial coat followed by pass with 220 on ROS, then two – three coats of Varathane Floor semi-gloss brushed on with natural bristle. Sound like it will work as well for this application?
Any other suggestions?
TIA
Replies
Well, given the coffee maker and associated cups that will go with it... I'd use a vinyl sealer rather than the shellac, personally. Shellac doesn't stand up to moisture at all. Whereas vinyl resists moisture very, very well.
Regards,
Kevin
We've got a maple solid wood countertop with walnut edges in the guest room, but no coffeemaker. I built it in about 1980 and finished it with 3 coats of Deft (no sealer). It looked pretty bad by 2003, so two months ago I sanded it down to wood in some places and to intact finish in others and gave it 3 more coats of Deft with a natural bristle brush. I called the Deft company to make sure the 2003 Deft is the same as the 1980 Deft, and they said yes, it is still a nitrocellulose base but they don't put that on the label anymore. The countertop now looks as good as new except for the inevitable dings and dents accumulated over 23 years, which the Deft does a good job of minimizing. Even though tne can says you can recoat in 2-4 hrs, I did one coat per day. Adequate ventilation is a must with this stuff.
John, if the maple plywood has an exceptionally nice figure and you really want to bring it out, I'd suggest you first give it a coat of tung oil. I would follow this, pretty much as you've suggested, with a coat of shellac to seal it and help build up a glass smooth surface. If the surface will be taking a beating and be exposed to a lot of heat and/or moisture, your top coats (preferably several of them, with light sanding between coats) should be a more durable, solvent based varnish. Normally, I detest using the polyurethane varnishes, but they do have some functional advantages on a table top (the only purpose I every use them for), in that they produce a very hard impervious film.
Well, just the shellac brought the figure out nicely. Waiting for some time now to finish the trim and start the multi-layers of semi-gloss varnish. Thanks. Didn't know that shellac would stick all that well to tung oil, but I suppose that's really a useful function of shellac....as a sticky layer between two somewhat dissimilar finishes.
Yes, I think shellac is the most useful (and under rated) finish available. I use it all the time. Because it is alcohol based, it's a great barrier coat between other stains and finishes, it dries quickly...and it builds and fills the surface on woods with moderately open texture. Works great on both birch and cherry. I also like the slight amber glow that even clear (white) shellac provides...and I also use various types of the darker, less refined shellacs when I'm trying to achieve an antique look.
Edited 9/22/2003 11:12:37 AM ET by Jon Arno
It's going to be interesting to see how the colors match on this project. The plywood is new and so far has one coat of shellac. The edge banding is made up of ripped down maple flooring that was left over from a flooring project from 6 years ago and was bottom and top sealed with Mautz clear oil-based sanding sealer. I think I even did a pre-install coat of Mautz varnish on the "good" side. So I have a mixture of raw maple (the exposed recently ripped edges from the flooring), maple with two (?) coats of varnish, and the plywood with one coat of shellac.
Maybe after this is all assembled, I should coat everything with another coat of shellac before I start varnishing. Kind of like establish a ground zero.
I think that extra coat of shellac on everything is a good idea. Should help to moderate any remaining contrast. No matter what you do, you won't get a perfect match in appearance, since the face venner on the plywood is (most likely?) rotary cut, while the maple flooring is probably plain sawn. If you get lucky on your finish treatment, you'll be able to achieve a uniform color, but not a comparable figure.
No, the plywood is sliced and matched. Wouldn't even considered it (it's probably $100 plywood) except got at Menard's on special ~$30 a sheet. There are some very minor flaws that will mostly be cut out of the finished surfaces.
So far, the figured plywood looks "framed" by the edge banding, which is plain sawn.
I'll try to post some pictuire when it gets done.
Edited 9/22/2003 12:08:29 PM ET by johnnyd
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