Dark and light maple glue up; how to blend

[Travis]

I am at the point in the project where it is time to apply the finish. I plan to use this process suggested by local experts.

Sand 120, 180, 220
Raise grain with distilled water
Sand 220
Die to color with water base die with 1/2 to 1/4 cut
lightly sand with 220
seal with clear shellack
seal with very ligth coat of toned shellack
seal with clear shellack
top coat with varnish

Top Coat Question:

I plan on using the materials below. The only deviation from the above procedure is to top coat with "Arm-R-Seal Ureathane and Top Coat" as recomended by the fellows at Klingspore. I think I confused them and myself trying to decide on the varnish type and ended up buying this stuff. Does anyone have experience with Arm-R-Seal with this application. The Arm-R-Seal is applied with a cotton cloth.If I was to use varnish, what brand is suggested. Can you apply varnish with a spray gunand could I apply with a spray gun.

Dark/Light glue up question:

Please note the difference in the colors of the glue board below. Will the transtint blend this enough so that it is not too noticable.

 

[McRabbet]

Travis,

I use Arm-R-Seal, too, but I've always used Seal-A-Cell first as the sealer coat. Results always good in my use on White Oak. Depending on how dark the Trans Tint is, you may need to apply a little more on the light portions of your panels to get an even coloration.

 

[woodguy1975]

Dude, you may need to use multiple toner coats (ie transtint in shellac) to blend them. Remeber the more coats the darker the finish will be so you'll have decided how many coats and what strenght of color gives you the overall color you like with satisfactory glueup blend. The amber tint that the Arm-R-Seal will give will also aid in the color blend.

The true solution for this issue is to color match the raw wood a little better. :lol: :lol: :lol: Maple has lots of color variations so it is always tought to get that even finish.

Another trick is to pair up the drawer fronts so the color mismatch flows over the two drawer fronts so it is not noticed as much. A sudden change with in the drawer front and from drawer front to drawer front will produce the worst case senario for noticing it.

Good Luck dude,

John

 

[Monty]

Transtint will tint everything the same, so the dark boards will still be a little darker. You might try spraying the whole panel with the dye first so the overall tone will match, then mask off the darker board and spray the rest. I used this technique for these two cherry table tops:

Both of these tops had similar color matching problems like you see on the left, and after this process they both looked more even like you see on the right.

 

[Travis]

Thanks fellows. I almost went back to the the lumbar yard to buy additional board to better match the color but wanted to hurry the project along. (Haste makes waste.) I will start spraying dye tonight on a sample board and post up results.

 

[Travis]

The image below is what I did tonight playing around with the finish. The light side was done with one pass of transtint dye in distilled water (1 part dye-100 parts water). The middle was done with two passes and the dark was done with 3 passes. I then sprayed 1lb cut of shellack. The LOML wants a little darker finish so I was curious how much die to add to the shellack.

 

[DavidF]

What colour transtint are you using Travis?

 

[Travis]

Golden Brown #6002. Just finished spraying the coat with shellack mixed in it. Looks good so far.