Mixing stain with poly?

[Mark Bolton]

Nothing I am thinking about doing but was just doing some searching on the net and stumbled across several posts on various forums with people asking about mixing oil based stains (most commonly minwax) with oil based poly.

Of course there were many mentions of the minwax polyshades (which absolutely sucks in my opinion) but I was surprised at how many replies said it would be no problem.

I would assume its not recommended by any of the finish manufacturers but didnt know if any here had ever heard of it?

Mark

[Joe Chritz]

It essentially creates a slow drying, hard to stick to anything, must brush on toner. I can see no upside and many downsides to it. As mentioned it is what polyshade is.

Now mix some transtint into shellac or laquer and you can spray it on to get all kinds of effects. Same principle (color in a finish) but much more workable and regularly used.

Joe

[Scott Holmes]

Mixing stain with poly makes a toner. A varnish based toner... Bad idea.

Most toners are lacquer based or shellac based.
Toners work best if they dry VERY, VERY fast, like less than 10 minutes.

Toners are sprayed 99% of the time. Makes it easier to control color (tone). Brushing on a toner is next to impossible.

Varnish can't be sprayed without all kinds of prep to contain overspray; and in dries VERY SLOWLY. Brushing is frustrating at best, sickening a worst. It tends to pool and drip run and sag as it SLOWLY dries leaving very obvious, dark sags drips and runs.

I once heard (actually saw an e-mail) that "Minwax PolyShades was the worst thing to ever happen to a can." I agree.

[Pat Barry]

I did exactly this several years ago to even out the appearance of a project I was working on. Now that I have learned a bit from the folks around here I would not do this again. It is a layer of color on top of the wood and will chip off, etc. Don't get me wrong, the end product looked good, but it was difficult to work.