Staining/Dying QSWO

[Rob Young]

Solid. Yes, its walnut.

Lots of ray fleck!

I think John was referring to the movement of the panel vs the frame.

Q/S white oak at 3' wide over a 10% swing in relative humidity will still move between 1/2" and 5/8". The finish will not stop if from moving, only change the rate at which moisture moves in and out of the wood.

If the frame or table-top mounting method can't accommodate this, stuff happens.

[John TenEyck]

Solid. Yes, its walnut.

How did you deal with seasonal wood movement?

John

[Stan Calow]

Robert, did you sand back after applying the dye to get the contrast, or is the dye taken differently by the rays?

[Robert Engel]

John & Rob,

Well I’m hoping there won’t be a problem. It is kiln dried and the wood has been very stable. Still, I do expect it to shrink some once moved inside, but hopefully not to that extent.

The breadboards are made to accommodate movement. Perhaps the bb didn’t show in the pics.

Stan,

No that is the appearance just after dye. I sanded just lightly before applying shellac. On several test pieces I tried sanding back and also presanding with finer grits prior to dyeing. I didn’t notice an appreciable difference.

I sealed with amber shellac and the glazed with gel stain. The gel stain definitely reduced the pop, but it also gave a lot of depth.

Top coating in process. I’ll post some pics of the finished top soon.

[Robert Engel]

Well here is the end result. A little darker than I was expecting after the gel stain, but still I'm pretty satisfied it seems to blend well with the walnut. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with my first attempt at a project this big.

This project turned out to be a long, drawn out affair. I ended up ripping the top apart twice, once to remove a walnut center strip I didn't like, and another time after realizing I had mixed up the grain patterns (duh)!! I put a gently arc on the breadboard ends which is very attractive.

Then after the top was finalized & glued up, I ended up changing the design of the trestles completely. The original trestles were white oak and had curved pillars. I think it was a good decision. I learned a lot along the way, but mostly I learned that patience can lead to stagnation, similar to "paralysis of analysis".

One word of advice learned the hard way: DON'T sand the pins!! Or do it extremely carefully. There are noticeable divots on some o of the pins where I over sanded with the random orbital. I couldn't reach the pins with my chisel and I was scared of tear out using a plane.

I sprayed two coats of Emtech 2000 semi gloss and topped that with 2 coats of Emtech 8000 satin.

I did a lot of experimenting with different dyes & techniques. I will be posting the some pics of the effects when I get everything together.

But for now, all I can say is this one is in the books, I've go my shop back and


Free at last, Free at last, thank God I'm free at last LOL


Thanks to Jim Becker and everyone else for all the help and advice.

Sorry I couldn't get enough light on the base.

Yes, I will be dying the wedges a little darker ...... eventually

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[John TenEyck]

Glad to see you installed the breadboards so the panel can move - because it will as the RH changes. My friend built a dining room table a couple of years ago out of African mahogany which is pretty stable. The field moves at least 1/8" on each side of the breadboards with the seasons. He took that into account while building it, but not while finishing it. The first Winter the finish cracked right at the seam where the breadboards meet the field. I hope your table fairs better.

The better way would be to finish the breadboard ends separately and install them afterwards.

John

[Robert Engel]

Thanks John,

Since last month we have been in monsoon type weather here. I was really concerned about spraying the finish. I held off on spraying because of it and finally decided the heck with it I'll see what happens.

I used water based and it all seemed to work out ok.

Since the wet weather has started you can feel the table has expanded just a bit wider than the bb's on one side.

Now that its inside the house, it will go the other way -- not too far I hope.

I had originally planned to store the top inside the house and let it acclimate before doing the bb's. but it just didn't work out it was too heavy to tote back and forth.

[Dave Cav]

That's a nice looking table.

I know it's already finished, (I'm coming in late to this thread) my preferred method of darkening QSWO is by ammonia fuming. It's a lot of trouble but you can easily control the darkness and the results are fantastic. The only problem is the sapwood doesn't darken much.