On Sun, 07 Nov 2004 03:17:19 GMT, "toller" wrote:

I finished my first project with boiled linseed oil on spalted maple today.
Well, I am still finishing it. The instructions say to apply and wipe the
excess off 20 minutes later. I have applied about 5 times and it is bone
dry when I go back to wipe.
How much is enough? Do I have to keep pouring it on until there is excess,
or have I already overdone it?

Not if it's still soaking in oil. Spalted maple is pretty porous
stuff.

Looking this up in some books is even more confusing. They say it is
essential to sand to 600 or even 1000 grit. Then you oil, dry, sand, oil,
dry, sand, and repeat forever. Do people really do this?

Some people may. I never bothered and my projects came out just fine.

Another author says he likes to oil, shellac, and then use water based poly.
Will that be significantly different than either just danish oil, or oil and
oil based poly? How? He doesn't really go into WHY he likes to do it.

To quote Kipling: "There are nine and sixty ways of composing tribal
lays, and every single one of them is RIGHT"

There are probably more ways to finish a project than there are to
make it in the first place. I like linseed oil on carvings and other
non-furniture projects (and some furniture projects as well), but it's
a personal preference.

Of course different finishes give different results, there are some
finishes that flat won't work at all (using lard on salad bowls comes
to mind) and there are some that work better than others in specific
applications. Your choice and I don't think you made a bad one.
--RC
That which does not kill us makes us stronger.
--Friedrich Nietzsche
Never get your philosophy from some guy who ended up in the looney bin.
-- Wiz Zumwalt