Trying something different... BLO

[Brent Grooms]

Will BLO tend to amber like Danish oil (natural color) or will the color remain more "true"?

The wood that is going to be finished is red oak.

I am trying to get an idea if this is what I want to use. Also, How long would you suggest to let the BLO 'dry' before topcoating?

[glenn bradley]

I used BLO as a base on a red oak piece and am very happy with it. Color has remained true. It moves the oak into more of a brown hue which is what I was after.

It will dry based on environment. I continued to wipe down 'weeping' for a couple days and let it dry a week. I have done other pieces with a 50/50 - BLO/Mineral Spirits mix that dried in a couple days but darkened the color much less so you can judge by your desired result.

One thing I did that many suggest is to make a test board. About 4" wide by 36" long, marked off sections with a felt pen after sanding and tried various finishing protocols. By following the sanding and finishing protocol of the sample carefully on the 'real' piece, I got a great match. BLO has become a mainstay in my collection of regular finishing products.

[Jim Becker]

In addition to Glenn's comments, do be aware that red oak has a very open pore structure and you'll need to allow extra time for the BLO to cure and also be prepared to wipe off any "weeping" from those pores. Nature of the wood...

[Glenn Madsen]

There are a bunch of species that are sold as 'red oak'. Not all of them behave the same. You'll want to test on scrap to see how yours works.

And not all BLO is the same, either. Test with what you'll likely use.

I did a number of pieces with BLO, and dewaxed amber/blond shellac over it, not really waiting all that long - at most a couple of days, sometimes much less. Jeff Jewitt had an article on the method in FWW (I believe) a month or three back.

The oak is going to change colors anyway, with exposure to light, and the ambering of the oils and topcoat. You just have to know. I don't like the pale pink color anyhow.

[Doug Shepard]

I've only used it on cherry and maple. On cherry, it will really darken it where on maple it tends to be sort of an amber. Sounds like red oak behaves more like cherry from Glenns comments. At the risk of darkening it even more, you can set it outside in the sun to really speed up the curing. I normally like to wait a week if I can but have applied dewaxed shellac and/or wipe-on poly over it after 3-4 days without any problems. I would think you could shrink that in half if you let it bake in the sun for a bit. We're due for some hot temps today. Put some on some scrap and set it out to see what happens colorwise. You might want to do 2 scraps and leave one inside so you can see what the suntan effect is.