Refinishing veneered doors

[Jack Tavolario]

Lookin’ for a little of that “old guy” knowledge like my dad used to have.

When we built out home in 1987, we put in solid core oak veneered inside doors. Like all the cabinets, they’ve taken quite a beating, and we’re slowly but surely doing our best to make them look a bit better than they do. Unfortunately, the kids and the wife weren’t very careful with throwing things like clothes and towels on the floor, then opening or closing the doors. As a result, there are places where the veneer has come loose, and in some places even broken off.

I’m in the process of gluing down what I can, but there will still be some places without that to veneer, and some places were even the 2nd layer is gone. A friend of mine said there was stainable wood putty that could be worked into the voids, then sanded and stained when the whole door gets redone.

Another friend gave me a new jar of Golden Oak Minwax wood putty that is to be used after staining. I read the instructions and it says it will not dry to a sandable surface.

What I’m looking for is a product that can be used to fill in the voids, be able to de sanded, get stained the same color as the door, within reason of course, then be finished.

I realize the finished product isn’t going to be just like a new door, but we really don’t want that ragetty looking garbage down there that snags on just about everything.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

[Scott Holmes]

Stainable wood filler is a marketing term...

Yes it will accept stain; it will look like stained wood filler, not wood. You can add color to the filler BEFORE you apply it.

Better solution would be to cut small pieces of veneer and piece them in where needed. Since it's near the bottom of the doors a perfect match isn't needed.

This will look much better than any filler.

[Dee Gallo]

To add to Scott's suggestion, I recommend taking a piece of white paper and a pencil to make a rubbing of the jagged areas. Then you can trace this onto your veneer and make a pretty accurate cutout to fit into the spots where the repairs go. If you label them "1", "2", "3" etc., on both the doors and the pieces, it should be simple to glue them into place later.

:) dee

[Jack Tavolario]

I decided to take ya’lls advice and give replacing the door skin and veneer with patches a try.

In the meantime, I decided to take a door that didn’t have any problem but needing a facelift, and see what could be done.

These are oak vaneered. First I sanded both sides with 150, then 220. Then I applied the stain, just as I did with some cabinets we just did, as per the instructions. OOPS! The stain didn’t take evenly!

In places where the sandpaper got down to the veneer, the color was lighter, so I stopped right there and turned the door over. Even though I’d already sanded it, I applied Jasco stripper to try to remove any residual finish. Again, using the instruction. After scraping it off, I got some steel wool and mineral spirits and scrubbed off any remaining finish. Then I wiped them clean with alcohol, but those discolored areas are still there.

I even flipped the door back over and stripped it with the Jasco, cleaned it with the steel wool. Wiped it with the alcohol, and hit it with 100G, 150G, and 220G, and those darker and lighter areas are still there, and I’m out of ideas and almost my mind as well. ;)

I think I’m leaving the stain on long enough to take, but can it be that I’m not, and that’s why the colors won’t blend?

This is a bedroom door, so its not gonna be the end of the world if it isn’t perfect, but I’ve got 14 other doors to do, and some of them are in high exposure areas.

Looking for more ideas.

Thanx!

[Dee Gallo]

Jack, if you are looking for a golden oak look, why not use shellac (cut 50/50 with DNA)? You can control the color better than with a stain since you can layer more orange over the light areas and less orange over the rest.

Once the first layer seals the wood, you don't have to worry about how the wood is going to absorb since it lays on top. And you would want to put several coats on anyway to get it to look its best so all blend lines can be no-fill-paper hand sanded or alcohol-wiped away.

You would just have to have 2 different colored cans of shellac at the same time and work them wet-on-wet for the first couple of coats. Once you have it even, you put a final coat of one or the other to make a nice even surface.

I would coat it with something like poly-oil afterwards to protect the shellac from moisture and I prefer furniture wax over that for a smooth hand.

It was very common in the "old days" to treat oak with shellac and it looks good.

My second suggestion is a coverup technique, using pigmented stain like they make for outdoor decks. Find a color you like and paint it over the sanded door - the pigment covers a multitude of sins, evening out the color but still allows the wood to look like wood because the grain will still show. It does have a "thicker" appearance, but looks better than some of the so-called antiquing kits I've seen people use to change the color of wood.

Good luck, dee

[Scott Holmes]

I aggre with Dee on the shellac used as a "toner" to color the wood.

As for your sanding the old finish... sanding is a poor way to remove old finish unless you remove lots of wood (as when sanding a floor). A chemical stripper is much better. The "green" strippers are only so-so at best.

I disagree with an exterior stain; I say a better choice as a "glaze" would be a GEL STAIN. Exterior finishes are very soft.

[Jack Tavolario]

OK, let me go back just a bit. The wife went down to Home Depot and asked for something to redo our cabinets. She took a door and they gave her MinWax Golden Oak Stan & Seal, and Minwax Polyurethane.

They said to sand with 150 then 220, then stain and the stain will blend with what was there. To tell the truth, that didn’t work badly at all. I caused a bit of a problem creating bubbles in the final coat, but other than that, those 2 projects came out fine.

In between the doors and the cabinets, I went after the kitchen table that had been dented, scraped, burned, and generally beaten up. Used Jasco 15 to get rid of the finish on the table, and it worked great. After I sanded and stained and applied a finish coat, it had brush marks in that were terrible, and that’s when I got steered into the Arm-r-seal.

Unfortunately, the brush marks were so bad, the final coat looks pretty dull on part of it, so I’m guessing I’ll strip it again and do it right this time.

In the meantime, I attacked the doors. After all, its kinda silly having nice looking cabinets, but doors with 20+ years of wear on them. Like an idiot, even though I had a gallon of Jasco sitting right there, I ASSUMED sanding and staining would turn out just like the cabinets. MAJOR WRONG! Won’t do that again!

But now I’ve got this door I’d sure like to get finished, and with what I have if possible. I don’t mind getting the “right” thing though, as long as I don’t’ have to spend 4 days on each door, like this one.

I’m not familiar with all the terms, so I’m gonna guess here. Is shellac cut with 50-50 DNA, the same thing as the Minwax polyurethane mixed 1 to 1 with denatured alcohol, then wiped on as opposed to brushed on?

I’m sorry to be such a pain, but its been many a moon since I watched dad build cabinets, and I’m certainly now only a novice, so you’ll have to be patient.

I’m slow, but I eventually get it, and I’m not ashamed to ask questions as you can see.

I really appreciate your help, and will be calling on you even more when its time to start on the kitchen cabinets. The wife picked out a light blue/grey stain that looks like paint. Over the years its worn off around the grab points. (She didn’t want knobs or handles) WRONG! ;)

Anyway, they’re gonna need to be stripped. Don’t bother to say it. The sandpaper won’t get touched until the gel has done its thing! Then we’ll want to re-stain and finish. Hopefully by then, I’ll have the first part down pat. LOL!

Thanx again!

[Scott Holmes]

Shellac is not measured in thinner to mixed shellac its measured in "cuts".

1 pound in one gallon of DNA is a 1# cut 2# in a gollon is a 2# cut. etc.
For smaller batches 1 oz in cup (8 oz) of DNA is a 1# cut; 2 oz in a cup... etc.

If you are using Zinnser premixed shellac the amber and clear are 3# cuts of shellac and the sealer is a 2# cut of DE-WAXED shellac.

DNA is NOT a good thinner for varnish (poly is a type of varnish) mineral spirits (MS)used to thin varnish.

Dee, many poly product now-a-days are too thick to use straight out of the can. VOC regs are the reason. They are NOT formulated to the best viscosity it's all VOC regs. Thinning most varnishes 50/50 with MS will create a wiping varnish.

[Jack Tavolario]

Well, I’ve taken the next step, and if I wasn’t a grown man, I’d cry. It seems I’ve been an unknowing victim of corporate ignorance.

The last time we went to Home Depot to pick up some supplies, I thought rather than continuing to by quarts of MS, I’d save some money and buy a gallon. So I told the worker at HD to give me a gallon of MS, and he handed me a gallon of supposedly “green” Klean Strip odorless MS.

After I’d applied the gel stripper and scarped it, I put some of this stuff in a clean can and used it along with steel wool to clean up any excess on the door, then wiped it. I noticed a slight white haze, but didn’t think a lot about it. Later on, after I’d cleaned off all the finish I could and sanded it, this white haze was still there. So, I cleaned it again and had my son use abrasive pads to get in the grooves, but although it got a bit better, it still didn’t go away.

I thought that applying a coat of finish would surely cover it, but alas, it didn’t completely do it, so now we’ll have to live with this door that in my opinion doesn’t look very good. I’m hoping the 2nd coat will cover the rest of what’s left, or at least mitigate it, but I’m really distressed. Stripping and varnishing a door shouldn’t take the hours and hours I’ve had to put into this thing, even with the first timer mistakes.

[Jack Tavolario]

More on the white residue.

After many hours of scrubbing, scraping and generally getting depressed about this white stuff, a friend of mine, a long time woodworker came to see it and offered to show me how he does it. Net result is that he fared no better.

After an hour or so, he said he advised to change the product. I was given JASCO Paint & Epoxy remover by the folks in the paint department, but he suggested I quit using that and get the JASCO stain and Varnish remover.

Although I don’t really understand the chemistry of it, common sense tells me that I don’t have either paint or epoxy, but rather stain and varnish, so I’m ok with it.

In the meantime, I’d called the JASCO experts line and talked to a fellow there, and after a while he said he couldn’t understand what was going on, and asked me to send him some pictures he could give to the chemists to see if they could help.

This morning I got this e-mail from him.

What I would do is get the Jasco Varnish and Stain Remover. Dip a scotchbrite pad in the remover and wipe the door down in the direction of the grain. Don't leave the stripper on too long, or it may cause more runs. Have the door in a horizontal position when stripping, and do small sections at a time. You may also want to strip the recesses in the door a little more. It appears there's still a little bit of the old finish in there.

So, later on today I’ll be seeing if I can find this other product to see if it does the trick. ;)

[Scott Holmes]

Jasco stripper doesn'yt have enough Methylene chloride to do much of anything... This is the ingredients that actually does the work. 125ppm is only a trace.

Look for a stripper with the Methylene chloride listed as one of the first few ingredients. Crown makes one that is sold at the big box stores.

[Jack Tavolario]

Jasco stripper doesn'yt have enough Methylene chloride to do much of anything... This is the ingredients that actually does the work. 125ppm is only a trace.

Look for a stripper with the Methylene chloride listed as one of the first few ingredients. Crown makes one that is sold at the big box stores.

Well, it stripped ok, but that damnable residue was a killer!

I ended up buying a product called BIX from Home Depot. Here’s the listed ingredients. Methyl Alcohol (CAS 67-56-1) Methylene Chloride (CAS 75 09-2) Acetone (CAS 67-64-1) Toluene (CAS 108-88-3) and Potassium Hydroxide(1310-58-3)

The one thing about this stuff that’s a lot different, is that it sure isn’t as quick as the JASCO product I was using, but its very much easier to deal with. 1st of all, water is used rather than DNA or MS. That alone makes it easier to take.

I had to do the door all over again to get that residue off the flat surfaces as well as the routed areas, but once I did, it was like a miracle took place! After a week, the door is finally done!

It isn’t perfect because of all the screwing around I did before I got everything “right”, but it ain’t bad, and I’m feeling pretty good about trying it on another door.

I sure want to than everyone who helped! Unfortunately it was a series of complications, but I’m pretty sure I’ve finally gotten it straightened away! ;)

Now I’ve got to try to deal with the veneer again. Let me try to explain what this predicament is. I decided that its well worth takin ya’lls advice and just cutting off the old veneer and replacing it. I understand that it will be a bit time consuming, but that’s no biggee.

It seems that I’ve first got to make sure I’m speaking the same language you guys are, so bear with me. These doors are solid core, then there’s what I’m going to call a “skin” glued to the core. Then there’s an oak veneer glued to that.

The skin isn’t very thick, maybe a 16th or so. There’s no problem finding the veneer, but no one around here has this skin. A fellow down at the Woodcraft store suggested using BONDO because it would dry hard and could be sanded flat, but I sure don’t want to try that unless there’s nothing else that can be done.

I took some pics to try to demonstrate what I’m talking about. I hope they come through ok.

[Scott Holmes]

I'd take the oak veneer off in a big piece along a grain line. Then add veneer or plywood something the same thickness as the veneer backer, sand flat and re-veneer the door...

I would not try to put litle pieces in to fill in that much. If you pick the veneer patch well it will look like a seam between two pieces of wood (because it is).

[Jack Tavolario]

I'd take the oak veneer off in a big piece along a grain line. Then add veneer or plywood something the same thickness as the veneer backer, sand flat and re-veneer the door...

I would not try to put litle pieces in to fill in that much. If you pick the veneer patch well it will look like a seam between two pieces of wood (because it is).

Piece of cake. LOL!

Actually, the biggest problem right now is finding that backer. I’m about to try place that specialize in making doors. I wish I had the name of the place we got these doors originally, but I’m afraid that information is long gone.

[Scott Holmes]

YOu can use Bondo or Durham's Rockhard for the substrate if you want...DON'T get any on the veneer surface.