Greetings!

I just finished a Shaker shelf made with Flame Birch....this is my
first time using this type of wood....any suggestions on how to finish
it? ......I am interested in something that will bring out the figure
the best. I have very limited scrapwood to test with....

Thanks in advance....


Frank

I just finished a Shaker shelf made with Flame Birch....any suggestions on how to finish it? ......I am interested in something that will bring out the figure
the best.

Try TransTint Honey Amber (#6001) in a denatured alcohol solution. It
comes as a concentrated dye. Depending on the size of the project, I
usually half fill a bottle with alcohol and add the dye dropwise
(shaking it to mix it) until I get the color intensity I want. You can
keep testing it until you get what you want.

After the dye has dried you have several choices --- tung or "boiled"
linseed oil or a mixture of equal parts, linseed oil, varnish, and
turpentine. Let that dry.
Wax it with clear Briwax or Butcher's Bowling Alley wax.

It will really make the figuring jump out.

Bet my recipe looks pretty close to Joel's in the end.

I bult an entire desk top out of flame (as in on fire!) birch I was
lucky enough to come across. I sanded to 400 and got it all as smooth
as possible.

Clean with a tack cloth with some thinner on it (no paper towels, socks
or flannel) made of an old T shirt or something along those lines. All
cotton, white, no synthetics materials or blends to dissolve or leach
color.

To light off the grain, I used a formula I got right here about 7-8
years ago. Equal parts of boiled linseed oil, 3# cut shellac (Zinzeer
blond for me) and pure gum turpentine. (Pure gum as opposed
"turpentine" made out of who knows what). Stirred well, put in the
kitchen to sit overnight and then used the next day.

I put it on with a clean bristle brush pretty heavily and then wiped
any excess off. Not much as I rememeber as the wood was raw and this
basecoat/finsh is thin. Any place that needed a little more finish was
easily handled with a little on a piece of tack cloth. It made that
wood spring to life... it pentrated really well, and left the wood with
a beautiful honey color to it. All the flame showed beatifully.

Since it was going on desk top, I finished it with 5 coats of satin
poly, each coat thinned about 10% with mineral spirits and applied with
an 8" pad (no brush strokes).

The surface has worn exceptionally well and still looks great.

Robert

"Fingersintact" wrote in message
ups.com...
Greetings!

I just finished a Shaker shelf made with Flame Birch....this is my
first time using this type of wood....any suggestions on how to finish
it? ......I am interested in something that will bring out the figure
the best. I have very limited scrapwood to test with....


Minwax wipe-on poly if you are not going to change the color. Has the oil
the others recommend putting on separately for contrast, and will build to a
good finish you can look right into in about four coats on birch. You can
see the maple in this picture, couldn't find a birch example.
http://photobucket.com/albums/d160/G...t=0f24664e.jpg


Whatever you do, _don't_ use satin varnishes. You want look through at the
wood, not at scatter in the finish. Same reason you don't want to scuff the
final coat with steel wool.