How can I stain the body of a piece of furniture that has holly string inlay without staining the holly? The string thickness is 1/32nd of an inch. My hands aren’t steady enough to coat the string with shellac without getting some on the body, and I think the shellac will seep in under any masking tape if I try to mask off the holly.
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Replies
One trick with masking tape is to use very little finish (almost a dry brush) on the first coat so it does not seep under the tape and it will actually seal off the edge of the tape for subsequent coats with more finish. I have used this technique with paint, not with shellac though. I imagine it should work if the cut is heavy enough (3 lb maybe?), or perhaps spraying very thin coats of lacquer instead of brushing shellac? Also need to make sure the masking tape is suitable for masking alcohol-based or lacquer finishing products.
You can try brushing lacquer since it is thicker than shellac. Using an appropriately sized brush will go a long way towards doing a good job. Still, the results can be less than satisfactory, especially if you are using the thin stain, like Minwax; a gel stain would be better.
The best way is chemically alter the color of the wood. On mahogany and cherry, I do this with a mixture of lime and water (see the blog entry from May 2008 at the link below). Lye also works very well on these woods. Other woods may work also, but I have not tried it.
Rob Millard
http://www.rlmillard.typepad.com
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled