Replies

1. 
   SteveSchoene | Jun 19, 2009 01:16am | #1

   The secret is that the manufacturer lies on the label when he says the varnish should not be thinned.  The maker has limited the amount of thinners to meet regulations limiting voc's.  They they told you the truth, that you needed to thin with about 10% added thinner, that would be similar, as far as the regulations are concerned, as them putting the thinner in the can. 

   You however can add thinner and need to do so.  You do want thin coatings of varnish, and you also want to make applying varnish a two part process.  First brush on the varnish, spreading it to a thin even coat. Then, "tip off" the varnish to remove any remaining brush strokes or bubbles, etc, by just kissing the surface with your brush in an almost vertical position. 

2. 
   RDNZL | Jun 19, 2009 05:57am | #2

   Tom:

   Try wiping on a final coat after scuffing your last brushed coat w/ 220 or finer paper. To wipe, thin your poly 50/50 w/ mineral spirits.

   Works well for me.

3. 
   Gretchen | Jun 19, 2009 01:52pm | #3

   Don't just wipe on the last coat--wipe them all on, and have a nice smooth easy finish.  ;o)

   Gretchen
1. 
   PeterDurand | Jun 19, 2009 05:30pm | #4

   Along the same line, wipe on poly is now my first choice for finishing. A number of companies make that.Cheers, 

   Better life through Zoodles and poutine...

1. 
   Gretchen | Jun 19, 2009 07:01pm | #5

   I use (only) non-poly wiping varnish and make my own. No need to pay extra for a dilute product!!  ;o)Gretchen

1. 
   PeterDurand | Jun 19, 2009 08:14pm | #6

   I made a cherry desk for Sandra recently and tried Minwax Wipe-On Poly on it. Excellent results. I think it will be my first choice for a final finish in the future.Peter 

   Better life through Zoodles and poutine...

1. 
   Gretchen | Jun 19, 2009 10:36pm | #7

   Havning seen your woodwork, I KNOW it was.  But it's dead easy to make your own--and you might like the non-poly even better!  Just a thought.  ;o)Gretchen

2. 
   tom_47 | Jun 20, 2009 05:59am | #9

   Gretchen, Peter,
   What brand wipe on do you buy ?Tom

1. 
   Gretchen | Jun 20, 2009 02:42pm | #10

   I make my own non-poly varnish from Pratt&Lambert or McCloskey's, diluted with mineral spirits half and half. Gretchen

2. 
   SARGEgrinder47 | Jun 20, 2009 05:54pm | #12

   I want to be clear that I am not a finish guru so... I need life as simple as possible when I get to the finish and I get there about every two months on average. I finally learned to tip a brush and had not bad results brushing but....

   I tried wiping one day about 5 years ago. Do you need a few quality brushes as mine are available. I wipe-on pieces before assembly by blue taping them off. I use standard Mini-Wax cut to 66 2/3% for the first two coat to build a base. Lightly sand with 1000 abralon between coats and vacuum. And I mean lightly as you don't get the standard nibs you get with brushing.

   I purchase the plastic bottles at the grocery that have number increments so you can add 2 parts poly and one part solvent. I use naphtha as it evaporated much quicker than mineral spirits. It gets poured into a smaller plastic container about 3" x 4" I purchase at the grocery also.

   For the final coats I mix (cut) the poly to 50%-50% by using the numbered increments. If I fill with poly to say #4.. then naphtha to #8 on the bottle. Ahhh.. you know how to do math. Anyhow... keep it stirred and only pour out into the small container slightly more than you need.

   As far as purchasing pre-mixed wiping poly.. I cannot agree with Gretchen more about mixing your own. Why pay much for a small can of pre-mix when you can purchase a quart of poly for about the same price and do the same thing they have done to get ready to wipe out of the can. A quart mixed will yield about 4 times what you get in the small can.

   As I said.. I ain't no guru but you don't need to be using wipe-on poly and if I can do it flawlessly... anyone can. Trust me.. ha.. ha...

   Sarge..

3. 
   PeterDurand | Jun 20, 2009 06:42pm | #13

   Minwax Wipe-On Poly 

   Better life through Zoodles and poutine...

1. 
   whitedogstr8leg | Jun 20, 2009 07:05pm | #15

   I use Minwax Poly, right out of the can, no thinning.  A cheap bristle brush for each coat.  The only time I use a can of thinner is to clean other brushes I have.  Here it goes: 1) After the stain has dried( or the wood has been fine sanded) one coat of varnish, "tipped off" and allowed to dry ONE day.  2) Sand and clean this first coat( 220 grit, tacked off), apply a second coat and tip off.  allow to dry one day.  3) Sand the second coat with oilless steel wool (0000  grade) and clean off everything.  Apply third and final coat, tipping off as needed.  Allow to dry until no longer "tacky" to the touch.  Grab a clean cloth towel ( or even an old T-shirt) and start rubbing the surface, HARD.  Use lots of "elbow grease" on this step.  This is the "polishing step".  When done with this, leave the piece alone for a while, let the varnish "cure".  And that means NO finger-prints from handling the piece.  After the varnish has cured,  IF you want to coat it with a good wax, fine.   I rarely do, the piece is usually smooth enough to "pass the muster".   Just my $.02 worth.

4. 
   cowtown | Jun 20, 2009 04:26am | #8

   Brusing the stuff in my experience needs a fine brush with flagged bristles, and you have to "tip off", meaning that your last stroke is just lightly dragging the tip over the wet finish.

   The foam brushes work OK, but in my experience, the water base poly softens the cardboard stiffeners, so they don't last long enuf to even justify their (really low) cost. For foam application, I just use wedges of high density upholstery foam (a ten year supply is likely available free from your local upholstery shop), cut into wedges with a sharp utility knife. The finish don't care if the stuff is used, and yu simply toss the wedge when done. You get the hang of this real quick when you do your trials

   OTOH, spraying is another option. I picked up one of the small PC gravity feed sprayers for 25$ from the Dewalt store to spray stools (the big guns wouldn't fit easily between rungs. Had to adjust viscosity though, not with water, but with floetrol, which is some kind of alchemic thinner for latex which slows down drying and assists in levelling (Calgary is not only the home of the Calgary stampede, but it is also very dry)

   On some cans of poly, there is an advisory NOT TO OVERBRUSH. and that's probably because it dries so freakin fast. Dries, but doesn't cure. So if yer surface is still uneven-that doesn't mean you can sand it....an uncured poly finish will gum up sandpaper- and if yer using a ROS, you got more damage to deal with..

   But if you are confident enuf that you have enuf finish on it, after 24 hrs you can probably wet sand any brush marks out of it.

   ?enuf finish on the piece? well if your piece is stained, and the sand paper cuts through watever poly is on the piece and starts sanding throught the stain, well then you got yerself a dilemma. Now you got unstained wood . This happens particularly on edges or places where the water based poly has "raised the grain".

   I ain't no expert on the subject, this advice is from the school of hard knocks.

   And no can of poly I ever read said that it was foolproof. Finishing products are always in my experience treated as a modern sort of "alchemy". The more you know about "finishing" the more you start to understand what you don't know!!!

   Eric in Calgary

1. 
   boilerbay | Jun 20, 2009 04:25pm | #11

   Eric,"The foam brushes work OK, but in my experience, the water base poly softens the cardboard stiffeners, so they don't last long enough to even justify their (really low) cost."First off, I rarely use the poly stuff. I'm of the BLO, varish, shellac ilk. But when I do go to the dark side...The foam brushes I use (I only use Jen Brand) have always had plastic stiffeners in them, but no matter, I only use them once and then only for poly. At he cost of long hours of planing, gluing, mortise/tenon work, scraping, etc. on expensive woods, I think a 69 cent brush is disposable. Besides, only a new foamer has the crisp edge for "tiping Off". I've never had brush marks with foam.On the other hand, I have 25 year old Purdys that are religiously cleaned and my Windsor newtons for detail brushless work are mint.I think reuse of a foam brush, unless for latex is a false economy.

5. 
   dkellernc | Jun 20, 2009 06:56pm | #14

   Welcome to the dark side (insert maniacal laugh here).  I've been finishing projects for years, but have very lately come to the conclusion that polyurethane is just not an acceptable finish for anything other than a wooden floor.  I HATE the stuff.

   There's reasons - in my experience, cured polyurethane is just too soft, even after a couple of months (it does get harder as time goes by).  It simply scratches too easily, and repairing it as you would shellac or laquer isn't possible because the new finish will not dissolve into the old one.

   One of the reasons that woodworkers get sucked into using this product is water and solvent resistance.  Don't believe it - shellac and (especially) laquer have sufficient water resistance for all but the hardest-use kitchen table top, and for those applications, alkyd varnish is what I use.  It definitely has some of the same challenges as polyurethane when it comes to a brush-mark free finish and protecting it from settling dust until it cures, but the result is far harder than polyurethane.

   One note about polyurethane is that you can definitely sand it to flatten the finish and remove brush marks and dust nibs.  However, there are some special considerations - it's best to wait a couple of weeks to do this to allow the finish to harden, and lubricated sandpaper is necessary to avoid forming little places of hardened finish on the sandpaper, which can then mar the finish on the piece.  You can buy stearated sandpaper that works well for this purpose, and you can also make your own lubrication solution with water and detergent.

   One last consideration one sanding and flattening polyurethane - the last coat that you will sand needs to be fairly thick.  If you sand through this last coat, the places where you've sanded through will be visible as the successive layers don't dissolve into the former ones, leaving "witness marks".  Also, in my experience even heat-cured polyurethane (the heat curing substantially hardens the finish) will not allow complete removal of micro-scratches, even with special-purpose polishing compounds specifically designed for wooden-object finish rub-out.  Shellac and laquer perform much better in this respect - they will allow an absolute mirror finish after the final rub-out.