Tips, please for staining/dyeing hard maple

[ChrisA Edwards]

I just did the tops of two bedside tables and the frame on my headboard is hard maple.

I used two coats of GF water based stain and finished it with GF Gel Topcoat (Oil based)

We have some dark cherry furniture and wanted a close color match. Used GF Cabernet stain.

[Scott Holmes]

Maple bookcases before.jpgMaple bookcases After.jpg
Here's a before and after of maple that ABSOLUTELY had to MATCH the 3" thick black walnut breakfast bar I'm leaning against when I took the picture. Dyed, sealed with de-waxed shellac, then toner; finally a topcoat. Fireplace mantel AND maple stair railings to the 2nd and 3rd floors; railing on both sides of the stairs!Maple Railing.jpg

[Jamie Buxton]

More and more I'm against stain, especially in high-wear environments. Kids will scratch through the topcoat and the stain, and you have a very visible scratch. Don't stain maple dark. Use a wood which is a color they like, or at the very least close to the color they want. If they think they want maple because it is hard, offer them jotoba (aka brazilian cherry). Jotoba is much much harder than maple. It has a Janka rating of 3650 compared to hard maple's 1450. Yeah, two and half times harder. Because of its hardness, it is mostly used for flooring, but it makes beautiful furniture. The color is much darker than maple -- hence the marketing name brazilian cherry.

[glenn bradley]

Do the samples and show them what things are going to look like if she's dead set on maple. You may very well have to do some heavy toning with dyed clear coats to "get there"...

+1. Maple is a very versatile wood for the industry since it is so easy to color . . . that is, if you are gong to color it to the point where it is practically painted. Look around kitchen and bath displays. The colors of maple cabinetry are diverse. Very little of it looks like wood anymore though.

If they want maple and want it with the traditional mid-60's maple brown, dye it, seal it, glaze it and topcoat it. The upside is you can use some pretty questionable material since no one will see the actual wood anyway. I'm not trying to be a smarty-pants, just stating the facts. Maple, alder, and birch all accept heavy colorants well and look like Home Center cherry, MCM maple or other completely non-wood colors; reds, blues, greens.