Restoration Progress On My 1952 ER10

[etc92guy]

I would ( or wood ) suggest a test mule.......find another board with the same or approximate condition. Use that to see what treatment is going to work best.

[robinson46176]

I would probably just keep adding finish... Run it in the crack with something like an ear syringe and squeegee off the excess. Do it several times and sand it flat when dry.
A furniture repairer would probably use stick shellac.
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You could route them all out and do inlays.
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I have used that Durhams for about 40 years. Great stuff... In some applications you will need to put shellac over it to prevent bleeding or to eliminate texture variations. If painting over it use a product like Kilzs ( I forget the other big product name right now) or some other sealer to prevent bleeding.
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I once mixed up a soupy mix of Durhams and poured it in cheap plastic chess pieces (held upside down) to ballast them. It was a 100% improvement. It has been in them for maybe 35 years.

[mickyd]

After doing some web research on hairline crack filling (the search wasn't an easy task incidentally), I decided that I am going to try using a product called Titebond wood adhesive. It's advertised for crack / knot filling and has been around for sometime. It comes in a couple different viscosities depending on application. Since I have several hairline cracks on one of the boards, I need the thin viscosity so that it will wick into the very narrow voids. I'll keep you posted.

[mickyd]

Got set up this morning with all the stuff needed to fill the hairline cracks in my one bench board. A container of sanding dust I kept when I sanded the boards, the Titebond thin adhesive I picked up at Rockler, and a very thin jewelers screwdriver to pack the sawdust into the crack where is opened up a little wider that what you see.
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As I got ready to go, it thought of farmers post where he said he'd just keep adding coats. Since I planned on doing that anyway, I decided to put my stuff away and go with that process first. It is the patch of least resistance. If they don't fill with additional coats, I'll go back to plan A.

[charlese]

You can add layer after layer, after layer of finish coats (varnish, paint, shellac, etc) You will never get a crack filled unless you also sand, or scrape off the most recent coats adjacent to the crack.

When you build thickness that's exactly what you do. Build a mountain and valley higher - you still have a mountain and a valley. Only higher.

Had a Sunday School teacher that taught that lesson as he had us building and smoothing off wooden puppets for a Good Samaritan puppet show. There was a kid who hated sanding and thought he would just paint the pock marks full to smooth them off. He came to the show with a puppet with a fat pock marked face. His puppet played the part of a robber, not the Good Samaritan.

[mickyd]

You can add layer after layer, after layer of finish coats (varnish, paint, shellac, etc) You will never get a crack filled unless you also sand, or scrape off the most recent coats adjacent to the crack.

When you build thickness that's exactly what you do. Build a mountain and valley higher - you still have a mountain and a valley. Only higher.

Had a Sunday School teacher that taught that lesson as he had us building and smoothing off wooden puppets for a Good Samaritan puppet show. There was a kid who hated sanding and thought he would just paint the pock marks full to smooth them off. He came to the show with a puppet with a fat pock marked face. His puppet played the part of a robber, not the Good Samaritan.

Well I guess that puts me back to plan A or possibly even no plan at all. No biggie one way or the other.

[mickyd]

Seven coats into finishing my bench boards, I realized I have made an error in Nick's suggested finish recipe of 1 CUP (C) tung oil, 2 TABLESPOONS (T) spar urethane.

I was making my 3rd full batch when my brain started processing the formula. I was thinking, ....2C of tung oil and 4T of spar seems like an aweful lot of finish for only 7 coats!!! Then it hit me.

I am using the plastic disposable serving containers like the one you see a few posts back (the one with the sawdust in it) to measure out the 2 components. I have two sizes, 4T and 2T. I was using 2 of the larger cups full of tung oil and 1 of the smaller container full of the spar to make each batch. Well, for WHATEVER reason, I was thinking that the 4T container was 4oz. NOT!! 4T = only 2oz. This means the recipe ratio is actually using half the tung oil recommended........or 1/2C tung oil to 2T spar.

It is no longer the "Nick recipe" but instead the "mickyd recipe"!! The bright side is I know that I got good penetration of the finish since it took 5 coats before getting full gloss. It was soaking in up to that point.

The finish looks GREAT so far. I just hope it maintains the great properties Nick discussed. If not, no biggie. Strip and redo. A couple more coats and I'm done.

[robinson46176]

A couple more coats and I'm done.

How are the cracks doing?
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[mickyd]

How are the cracks doing?

They are unchanged. I haven't tried forcing the finish in as you suggested. They are sooooo narrow. Instead, I am going to wait until I've completed the finish coat and see how the thin CA glue works. It's wicking properties supposedly is excellent.

[mickyd]

When applying finish with a cloth, do you store the cloth in between coats for reuse? I've been storing it in a sealed ziploc with all the air removed and it keeps for about 3 consecutive days usage before I start detecting it stiffing up. This may seem like a "cheap skate" question since I could use a fresh cloth each day but I thought it was worth posting to see what others do. I do only have a certain number of retired cotton t-shirts to use as rags.

I was considering leaving the rag submerged in the finish (not the master container but a transfer container) or just rinsing the cloth clean in mineral spirits after each use.