Anyone used clearcoat over pigmented primer?

[John TenEyck]

I'm doing a budget job for a friend; a hanging wall desk and torsion box shelves above it, all in birch plywood. It's all going to be white. The BIN pigmented shellac based primer wasn't available when I was at the store, so I bought a gallon of BIN WB pigmented primer. It's white as white can be and says it's good under any finish. FWIW it sprayed great after I thinned it 5%.

Originally, I was going to topcoat the primer with GF's Enduro White Poly, but the primer looks so good I'm thinking about just applying some Enduro Clear Poly over it instead. Part of the reason for the question is I don't think I have enough White Poly left to do the job, but I have plenty of Clear Poly. I'll make a test piece to see how it looks but I'm wondering if anyone has done something like this and, if so, how it turned out? Thanks.

John

[Tony Joyce]

I have used SW precat Lacquer over, BIN shellac based primer. Not much help, but my experience was good results.

[Jim Becker]

I honestly cannot think of any reason why it wouldn't work well, John. If you have a good surface and look from the tinted primer, they clear coats should do the trick. If the Enduro clear poly is actually clear, should be a winner!

[John TenEyck]

Thanks guys. Time to make a specimen. Jim, Clear Poly is absolutely water clear.

[John TenEyck]

OK, to close out this topic I made some specimens and actually liked the clearcoat over the primer better than the GF White Enduro Poly. The adhesion and hardness were good so I went with it.

I sprayed two coats of BIN 123 WB white primer and one coat of GF's Enduor Clear Poly in satin to which I added additional flatters to cut the sheen even more. I think it looks great. The BIN 123 sprayed great after I added 6.5% water to it. It's not as hard as BIN pigmented shellac primer but it's much whiter and didn't raise the grain on the birch plywood I was using. It will corn on sandpaper if you sand too ambitiously but it's fine if you take it easy. The Clear Poly flowed out beautifully over it.

I used this finish combo on some wall shelves and a hanging desk for a friend's 7 year old son. I'm sure he'll beat the snot out of them so it will be interesting to see how it stands up.





John