Best way to darken soft maple well and then seal Stair Tread

[Marlin]

I am going to make some stair tread out of soft maple. I know its a closed wood and can have some issues if you try and stain it. I also read that dye works well but have never used it and also not sure if you can use a oil poly on top or would I need to use a water poly?


What I am looking to do it darken it to a redish-brown color and then seal with poly. I like poly due to it holding up well for floors so for stair tread I am thinking that should work well.

Is dye what I should use? Any brands to look for (have a woodcraft near me or can order online). I also have de-waxed shellac and used that for a wash coat on some popular and then coated with a gel stain. So I have used that and Gel before.

Thanks

 

[CrealBilly]

Hey Marlin, the best way I know how to darken soft maple is to leave it out in the weather for a few months... it'll develop lots of character and turn a nice shade of gray...

Seriously Wood Dye would be my first choice - practice on scrap till you get the color you want.

 

[Marlin]

Well don;t have time for the outside approach, that and wife would be a little upset seeing that.


Any dye better then others? I have a link at work for one place so I will post tomorrow. That and will oil poly be ok once it drys?

 

[Travis Porter]

I would use dye. Get some transtint or one of the other brands, mix it with water, spray it or brush it, let it dry for a couple of hours, knock down the grain, recoat it, let it dry, and then top coat it with Poly or your choice.

Woodcraft has Transtint I have used it heavily on soft maple cabinets I recently built.

 

[Marlin]

Yea Transtint is one I have read abdout as well as Arti Articidol
http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=10252

Might end up using transtint this time since it is close and if need be go get more as I work on them.

Thanks

 

[Travis Porter]

Dyes really are easy once you get into them. You will wonder why you have never used them before.

 

[Marlin]

Yea I guess I have used stains (and Gel on my last piece) as they are easy to come by and pretty straight forward. That and for some reason putting water on wood just by nature screams no.

But I found some pics of poplar done with dye and you think poplar never had any blotch/stain issues but the look of it. So I iwll update with pics in a couple weeks. Have to finish the basement water issues, electrcal issues (why do I keep getting shocked when i touch the ground?), and so forth.

 

[dkeller_nc]

Marlin - One of the best (and one of the few) ways to prevent blotching is to use a toner. A toner is any clear finish to which dye is added, and it's sandwiched between a clear sealer coat and the top, clear finish.

With trans-tint (which is what I use), you can mix it easily with shellac, and poly will bond well with shellac if you use it as a top-coat. Ideally, you want to mix shellac up from flakes, but you can also use Zinsser Seal-Coat. To do this, you wash-coat the stair tread with clear (un tinted) shellac, followed by a tinted coat of shellac. Let this dry for a minimum of 2 days - while shellac is dry to the touch after about 10 minutes, it still continues to harden and off-gas for a couple of days or so.

Then coat with poly. By the way - I'd recommend an alkyd varnish in place of the polyurethane. Alkyd varnishes cure harder (and faster) than polyurethane, so it will wear better. One trick to polyurethane is that it remains fairly soft for a week or two after its polymerized on the surface. You can accelerate the hardening by gently using a heat gun, or setting the piece outside in the summer sun. If you use either of these methods, be absolutely sure that the bottom coats have completely cured, and the poly's been given a day or so to harden up. Otherwise, the heating may promote some off-gassing that will bubble the finish.