[Woodcarver] Re: basswood

[Joe Dillett]

 Hi Joyce,

 The answer to your question if basswood can be stained the color of 
mahogany
 is yes.

 The blotchy look is because you're using a die stain on bare wood. A die
 stain is a low viscosity stain that soaks deep into the wood. Die stains
 don't generally work well for carvings because of the exposed end grain. 
The
 die stain soaks much deeper into the exposed end grain making it much 
darker
 and blotchy.

 There are generally two choices, 1) to partically seal with a sanding 
sealer
 before applying the stain or 2) use a pigment stain with a higher viscosity
 that doesn't soak in as far.

 A pigment stain has a higher viscosity and will not soak into the wood as
 much. Some stains are both pigment and die having a lower viscosity. I
 generally solve the blotchy problem by adding polyurethane varnish into the
 stain raising the viscosity and making it all pigment stain.

 The die stains look more natural because they work with the wood allowing
 the grain to take the color in different shades for the early and late
 growth of the fibers. The pegment stain has more of a tendency to lay on 
the
 surface and look like mud if you are not careful. The key is to use a 
sample
 scrap of wood with about the same carved texture as your finished piece so
 you can examine how the endgrain will be looking blotchy.

 Joe Dillett
 The Carving Shop
 645 E. LaSalle St. Suite 3
 Somonauk, IL. 60552
 (815) 498-9290 phone
 (815) 498-9249 fax
 http://www.thecarvingshop.com
 jdillett at thecarvingshop.com
 http://www.carvingmagazine.com Carving Magazine web site and Readers Forum
 http://www.carvingmagazine.com/chat/chat.shtml Live Chat for Carving
 Magazine.
 http://community.webshots.com/user/joe_dillett
 http://www.citizenactions.org
 **************************************************

>

> ----- Original Message ----- 

> From: "Joyce Hanna" <joycehanna at gwi.net>

> To: <woodcarver at six.pairlist.net>

> Sent: Monday, March 20, 2006 7:25 PM

> Subject: [Woodcarver] Re: basswood

>

>

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>> I am sure this has been addressed before and had I been paying closer 

>> attention I might not be writing to ask:  is it possible to stain 

>> basswood a mahogany color?

>>

>> I just stained poplar to a beautiful mahogany color using red dye in 

>> de-waxed shellac followed by General Finishes Rosewood water base stain. 

>> I put on another coat of the tinted shellac and followed that with Minwax 

>> wipe on poly and it came out real nice, and a very close match to the 

>> real stuff.

>>

>> I tried the same thing on "whitewood", which looks and feels like 

>> basswood.  It came out very blotchy; some of it took the stain and some 

>> didn't.  (All of it took the shellac dye). I haven't gotten to the poly 

>> stage yet; I want to nail the color first.  I'm not quite sure how to fix 

>> it, as I don't want it too dark, either.  The rosewood stain just didn't 

>> seem to penetrate the wood evenly.

>>

>>  Joyce

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>