While we were in Rochester, Jo Anne had asked if I could bring my orbital sander and help her refinish the top of an old table that had been in her family for a long time. So I had to hand sand some areas where the finish had been scratched down to the wood and had darkened. So I sanded these areas and then put varnish on the bare wood. I would hand sand that the next day to make it level, and then do another coat to bring the indentation up to the level of the finish on the rest of the table. After several coats in the damaged areas, I sanded the whole top of the table with my orbital sander and then varnished that. Then the next day I sanded the whole table top again and varnished the whole table top again. When I was done with two coats the table top looked so much better, but was not perfect because there were some areas where the varnish was absorbed by the wood and was not as shiny as the rest of the table top. Bummer. While sanding the whole table top, I would rub it with my whole hand to see if it was smooth everywhere. When I looked at my hand with the varnish dust on it I laughed because it looked to funny! So what did I do? Well, I photographed it, of course!
Standing ovation to those-who-refinish-furniture. I'm sure your efforts were very much appreciated.
ReplyDeleteOf course you photographed your hand! LOL I want to see a photo of the family heirloom table. I never thought of sanding only the damaged area first and varnishing it to bring it up to the level of the original finish. Interesting.
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A dusty hand over a furniture backdrop makes for an interesting photograph but what got my attention was how in the space of a short visit you were able to apply multiple coats of varnish and also be able to machine sand between coats. I had to Google "water based vanish" and low and behold there is such a thing. I have only used oil based varnishes in the past. I've got a couple little projects that would benefit from a quick and easy clear coating. Thank you for today's blog post!
ReplyDeletePrimo: Water based Polyurethane was mentioned at the Home Depot when we went to look for a finish. I have instead used the same oil based Polyurethane for the floors we have refinished here in Sea Cliff. I had no idea what the finish was on the antique table. So I disregarded the possibility of water based because I was not adding a finish to bare wood. So this was the oil based Poly. Actually I hand sanded between coats - I only wanted to put a light tooth on the surface and I thought that machine sanding would possibly cut through all the finishes if I was not careful. So just hand sanding. And this poly dries really quickly.
ReplyDeleteI laughed as soon as I saw the photo. You photographed your hand. Brilliant! Kudos to all the work that you put into the table. Betsey
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