Paint Oak?

[Paul Greathouse]

The deal is, I have a bunch of kiln dried red left over from when I built my son's cabinets last winter. Its mostly the appearance culls, we used all the really nice quartersawn pieces on his cabinets and what I have left is boards that have mostly a flat sawn look.

I am now remodeling my own master bathroom and I am getting ready to build two seperate 4' vanities. I am using Birch plywood for the boxes but instead of buying poplar for the face frames, is there any painting procedure I can use to hide the grain pattern in the oak so that it will appear smooth like painted poplar?

I have tried planing and sanding a piece. I applied two coats of Kiltz primer and sanded in between coats but I can still see the grain. I have worked alot with Red Oak but have always stained it. It may not even be possible to achieve a quality paint job on Red Oak but I thought I would see if anyone had an idea.

[Joe Petersen]

I believe an oil based paint will seep into the pores. I have never painted red oak so am not sure.

[Lucas Bittick]

I used red oak for plinth molding in high-traffic areas and painted it without a problem. Before the final sanding I applied a water-based wood filler. Then sanded, then primed. Since I am very detail oriented, I sanded after priming and and added a second coat of primer, but it would have looked reasonably ok without it. Everything appears appears smooth an non-porous.

I strongly recommend a wood filler. It isn't hard to use and saves you from the many coats you would have to use in sealing the oak with paint. I like finishing, but if you get easily frustrated with surface prep/finishing, then just go ahead and use poplar. Poplar takes paint so well and it will take some deliberate prep to get the oak to look similar.

[Mike McCann]

Paul

I have painted red oak before. to hide the grain I used grain filler all over the project then sanded it away then sprayed primer then milk paint then poly over that. here is a pic.

http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o223/mackel40/P1010001-1.jpg

[Paul Greathouse]

Thanks for the filler suggestions, I'll have to pick up some and give it a try on my experimental piece. Is there a particular brand that you like?

When I used to build cabinets for profit, I would hire out the painting and staining or the customer would do it themselves. At that time I didn't like painting, I was happier when making sawdust but the past couple of years I have been doing alot of it for myself and I'm beginning to enjoy it.

Thats a great looking project Mike, at least now I see that Oak can be painted successfully.

[Prashun Patel]

I wouldn't waste $$ on grain filler.

I'd skim the whole thing with plaster of paris. It's thicker and less brittle than drywall compound. If the piece won't receive a lot of movement, you can even use drywall compound. Scrape it flat while it's moist, and then sand it after it dries.

Then I'd prime the wood with Zinsser BIN (it's a shellac-based primer).

After this, you won't know the diff between red oak or mdf.