amber shellac...good or use something else better?

Curtton

Curtton

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i have no experience on wood finishing but i need to refinish wood in that orange/yellow color .

i went to homedepot and picked up bulls eye amber shellac.

can you guys tell me if this is a durable product ? will it crack in time? or is there some else that i should be using that will still give me that amber look.

thanks in advance for you help.
 
These days shellac is really only good a a sealer, under another finish. It should be covered with poly or tung oil. Frankly I would never use it on a gun. Better off with a stain, then tung or poly.
 
thanks chris, i returned the shellac and bot "minwax polyshades" it stain and polyurethane in one step , thats what i like about it i only have to buy one can .
 
Hey curton........Can you tell me more about this minwax polyshades.

Just bought a SVT 40 and the stock is rather extreme!
I would love to re finish with some semi dark or dark stain, and you seem to be up to speed on this stuff.

Was going to shellac the stock, but after what Chris said, I will skip it!

thanks
 
The polyshade is poly with stain mixed in, like farnish stain use to be
back in the dark ages.
It would work fine on a lite mil.stock, If you use it ,
thin the first coat so it will soak in the wood better.
Straight from the can, it will sit on the surface.
On a good quality walnut stock , I would not use it.
Way better off with a oil finish.
If you use poly., you must have all the old oil, grease and crap
off the wood, that is the hardest part of any stock refinish.
The only stripper I use any more is cira 18** ( I forget the *)
I works super, bush it on, waite, rub off, repeat if needed, last coat,
rub off with 0000 exta fine steel wool and it is done, you don't need to
wash it off.
Truoil stock refinish is a good choice, you rub it on in thin coats
till you get it built up - a few coats to 10-12 coats.
Vary tought finish, it is clear thou, but you can stain first.
Very hard stocks , like birch and maple do not take oil stain
very good, I use a spray stain- water or alcohal, but you have to have spray
equipment for that.
good luck, if it is not a high end stock, you can always strip off your finish
and try something else. good luck.
Marshall
 
For what its worth I prefer NGR stains even though they do fade over time. NGR is alcohol based and you can use a rag with thinner to even out the finish and of course it will not raise the grain. Also you can start putting finish on minutes after you are done staining. As for finish I like true oil or Linspeed. I also like this concoction. 1 part boiled linseed oil, 1 part spar varnish and 4 ounces of Japan dryer per gallon of mixed concoction. This concoction as I call it is pretty much the same as true oil. You can substitute Danish Tung oil if you like but it will stink for a few months. Rod
 
Polyurethane is for cheap furniture. Scratch it and you'll have to re-do the whole stock. Oil finishes like tung oil or BLO just need a bit more oil rubbed in to make a scratch go away. Neither need any sealer either.
Wood being wood, get yourself a book from your public library about finishing furniture. Refinishing a stock uses the same techniques and products.
Shellac was used on Warsaw Pact/Russian firearms because it's cheap and easy to put on. However, alcohol will dissolve it.
 
so I looked into reviews on that mixwax with poly.......That stuff gets the worst reviews ever, thick like honey, blotchy bubbles and super hard ot work with.........Although many praise the REGULAR oil based stains and THEN a poly sealer on top of that.

This svt stock seems like soft wood pine like or similar...... So ill try for the STAIN oil based only and then a sealer over top maybe oil or some poly or some thing.

Where can I grab some circa 18**?

Thanks every one
 
A customer showed me a stock he did using a finish from a pace in WA or OR. Very nice finish. They make stock tools, Jepson, jeffson, I cannot remember the name, but others may know it.
 
VooDooMan said:
Hey curton........Can you tell me more about this minwax polyshades.
Click to expand...

when it comes to refinishing im the wrong person to ask but i did use the "one step" minwax poly , i found it hard to work with , using a brush is the pits , no blotchy bubbles but i did end up with few lint spots and ofcos color selection was limited .

so my next project i tried the minwax stain and spray poly , far more work , had to spray poly 5-8 times , i had better result and it looked much better but i cant vouch for durability .
 
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