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Steve Turner Steve Turner is offline
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Default Zinsser Sanding Sealer vs. Shellac

wrote:
On Nov 25, 9:53 am, Steve Turner wrote:

Ah, well I did think of one more thing. I wonder if you have any idea how well this product
holds up to the long term effects of being in contact with the oils and sweat of human skin,
for example, on a computer desktop or the arms of a chair?


I have used this stuff for anything my clients would let me put it
on. I have refinished table tops, exterior doors, counters in a
bathroom, you name it.

In each application, NO problems. It is abrasion resistant, UV
resistant and protects the wood quite well. Applied correctly and to
the right thickness (finished thickness not less than 3 mil) it should
work great.

I put it on the front door of the Fair Oaks Country Club as well as
the entry access doors to the members areas and dressing rooms about
five years ago.

In five years of use, the doors look great. I hit them pretty hard on
the price of refinishing the doors as I had to strip off a few layers
of varnish, poly, and who knows what to get to bare wood. The finish
is holding up so well though that they are wanting me to do more when
the budget permits.


The UV protection is interesting to me. It will be four years ago in February that we
bought a house in Austin that faces the east Texas sun (better than west, but not by much),
and after two and half years the stained and varnished front door started looking like hell.
The varnish is entirely GONE from some of the houses across the street that face west. I
just refinished my front door earlier this year by spot sanding, touching up the stain, and
applying a couple of coats of McCloskey's marine spar varnish, but I have to wonder how long
that will last. Sounds like the Kwick Kleen stuff would be a good product to try when the
time comes. Might also want to try it on the black walnut swing hanging from the pergola in
my back yard, made for me by a friend in Missouri and also finished with spar varnish. It
ain't holding up...

snipped lots of good info about lemon oil and other "cleaning" products

However, the good news is that neither cleaner or oils did any harm to
the Kwickleen stuff even after being applied daily. The WD40 they
sprayed on the hinges and locks didn't seem to phase it either. That
really sold me!


Well if you're sold on it, then I am too.

A word of caution on this stuff. I tried brushing this stuff, and I
might as well have glued the brush to the wood. It goes off FAST. I
am fine brushing finishes that have long layout times like latex,
poly, or oil based stuff. But you can count the seconds you have to
get it right when you brush or pad this stuff. Their regular (non
spray formula - which I have sprayed!) may be different.

I am ONLY speaking of the spray formula. This isn't a problem for me
as almost all high performance finishes are made to be sprayed, some
spray only, these days.


I wouldn't dream of brushing something like this. I've been spraying stuff for 30 years, so
I'm already sold on the benefits. :-)

I've stopped using regular
nitrocellulose lacquer for things like this because it doesn't hold up well at all; it
breaks down and gets gummy, and you can scrape right it off with your fingernail.


Yeah, me too. There are too many other finishes out there that leave
it in the dust. I have no romance of connecting to the old ways of
finishing, ESPECIALLY if it comes as a compromise in performance. Not
one bit. One warranty call on my finish, and if it is the fault of
the finish I won't use it again.

I still shoot some Old Masters lacquer in occasion. Some folks don't
want to pay a few buck more for the good stuff, and that is certainly
their prerogative. The OM product isn't hard to find (I buy mine at
Benjamin Moore) and is easy to shoot and easy to build. It finishes
nicely and give good performance. No warranty from me though, except
against peeling.

Robert


Thanks for all the great advice Robert, as usual.

Scrolling ahead to page four, I see that it also comes in quarts. That's good, because I
was trying to decide which of the three grades (gloss, semi-gloss, or satin) to purchase; so
now I might just get one of each. A gallon would last me a LONG time, unless maybe I'd
could try to make some extra bucks by refinishing all the neighbors' doors! Any words about
which of those three grades you prefer using?

What about the product's ability to stay usable in the can? I'd guess that since it has the
property of melting into prior coats when applied that it wouldn't need something like
"Bloxygen" to keep it from wanting to "cure" in the can, correct?

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