For Chris and anyone else that's interested

[Bruce Shiverdecker]

Finishing Turnings, both utilitarian and artistic, can cause quite a lot of questions. Chris asked me how I did my finishing, so here's some thoughts.

What type of finish are available:

Oil

Oil that hardens

Poly

Shellac

French polish

And a number of others

What I'm going to offer is just my way of looking at the finish process. I don't want to cause an uproar.

Being somewhat of a purest, I like the beauty of wood to speak for itself.

Therefore, I polish the wood till it has a gloss of it's own. Like this one. It is Cherry and has an inherent glow that is warm and lovely.

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Right now it has NO finish on it. It has been polished to 4000. I feel the only reason to put any finish on it is to protect it, not to put an artificial shine on it. I'll put a light coat of Butcherblock oil on it and spin it in, then several coats of French Polish, Finally, I'll use the beal system to smooth out the Shellac and wax it.

Bruce

[Chris Barton]

Wow Bruce, that's an impressive finish for no finish at all! Do you leave any of your pieces unfinished (no solvent based finishes) and which ones do you usually reserve this no finish treatment for?

Thanks!

[Bruce Shiverdecker]

To date I have not left many without any protection. It would have to be something that will improve with patina. For instance, Cherry mellows automatically, So it gets protection. Walnut is very dark and the
oil from handling enhances the look, so I leave some of them without finish. As soon as I put the oil on this one, the French polish, and Finally the Beal system, I'll post pictures so you can see the difference.

Bruce

[Bernie Weishapl]

Thanks for the info Bruce. Do you leave any with just say a buffed wax finish? I just got a Beall system and had thought about some turnings with just carnuba wax or beeswax on them applied with the buffer.

[Bruce Shiverdecker]

Here are pictures of the rest of the finishing steps, for comparison.

Oil/ two coats of French Polish
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Tripoly Polish
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White Diamond Polish
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Carnuba Wax
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An attempt to show absence of a Finished look (Camera doesn't focus this close)
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This gives a finish that people OOOOO and AHHHH over and is as close as I can currently get to a Museum Quality finish.

Hope you found this interesting.

Bruce

PS to Bernie.

While I don't do that, I don't see how using the Beal system would not be better than just applying it by hand.

[Chris Barton]

Bernie,

I really like my Beal system (and hope to get it back up and working soon). I have found that with very tight grained woods like cherry, that working through the tripoli, white diamind, and then waxing with either a hard paste wax or with something like a polycrystaline polish can produce a finish of sorts that looks as good as a film finish. But, I haven't stopped at that point on very many pieces since I also notice that with time and handling the shine begins to fade.

[Christopher K. Hartley]

Bruce, thanks for the information it is very helpful. I appreciate the detail you went into. This is one of those posts I will archive and return to time and time again.:)

[Bruce Shiverdecker]

Thanks Chris. The pictures don't really do the piece justice.

Bruce

[Steve Schlumpf]

Bruce, thanks for your time and photo tutorial. It will be most helpful!