Hello again.

To you it’s a week since the last newsletter, but for me it’s only a day as we’ve had a number of questions already and this week’s newsletter has almost written itself.

The first question (which came from a newsletter reader) was about how to advise customers about the care of waxed bowls and the use of ‘domestic’ aerosol waxes on them. There should be no problems with compatibility here, there’s often not a great deal to them (one was even advertised once as ‘wax free’ which worried me a little) but they shouldn’t damage the wax finish. They probably also won’t do much to enhance it either sadly.
We’d suggest buffing the existing finish as and when needed with a clean cloth, wax is easy to revitalise and this can be done a surprising number of times. Once the shine stops returning an aerosol wax can be used but a paste wax – even just a furniture wax – would be better both for the wood and for the appearance. Thanks Alex for the question and your very kind words about us.

Another email this morning asked about using our Buffing System on an Acrylic Gloss Lacquer finish. Even after leaving it for 72 hours the buffing wheel seemed to be melting the finish and leaving a blemish.
We reckon that too much lacquer was being applied – it’s possibly skinning over on the surface and stopping the lacquer beneath from drying. When pressure (in this case from the wheel) is applied it breaks through the surface and exposes the still-wet lacquer beneath and will make a bit of a mess. A lighter coating should do the trick – we’re waiting to hear as I write this.
UPDATE – We’ve heard back and the problem has been solved, we’re not sure if it was a thinner coat or a slower buffing speed or possibly a combination of the two but job done!

And lastly for this week, a question about refinishing a pine table. (Strangely enough we have a video coming up soon about refinishing a small coffee table, more about that soon). In this case there were also some chairs to be finished, and as a slight colour change was required we suggested Finishing Oil for the table and Shellac Sanding Sealer and a tinted WoodWax 22 for the chairs. The important thing to take away from this, which hadn’t been realised before, is that what people think of as a pine table and chairs will in fact have beech chairs – similar but not quite the same so a little extra care needs to be taken when trying to match colours etc.

And that’s me for this week. I had a fun evening in Norfolk last week and welcome to all my new readers from there, this Sunday sees me in the West Midlands and then Tuesday night in the Lincoln area…and there was me thinking my travels had slowed down!
Have a great week and I’ll see you same time, same place.

Terry

PS. A couple of people had trouble finding our new Friction Polish video mentioned in last week’s newsletter, sorry, here’s a button to take you there if you missed it.