Hi

Well, after over two years of planning, a global pandemic in-between, two venue changes and two date changes… our Woodturning Weekender is finally here. I’ll be waking up in Canterbury this morning (assuming I manage to sleep!) to go and start getting things ready for our show. First job for me is probably putting the chairs out – you don’t get much more hands on than that! If you’re going to join us in person, I look forward to seeing you there. If you’re joining us online via our livestreams, please say hello. Today is probably your last chance to get tickets to attend, and also to get livestream tickets. Head over to the Woodturning Weekender website if you want to join in the fun.
But first… let’s deal with some questions

Someone contacted me this week about some turned items that had been left in the sun for a long period of time, and the colour had bleached out and they were looking a bit sorry for themselves. Could they be buffed using our Buffing Wheels? As long as the existing coating on them is sound, (not flaking or peeling off) it shouldn’t be a problem to buff them with the wheels. This will bring up a shine, but won’t, of course, replace the colour. One of our coloured WoodWax 22 range could be used to put some colour back, but care needs to be taken when buffing WoodWax 22 (Clear or coloured). It’s a little softer than the Carnauba Wax or Microcrystalline Wax, so a lower speed, and a little more time, is needed. More importantly, in this case, some of the colour will transfer to the wheel and it would need cleaning before being used again, in case it put some unwanted colour into a different item.

Another emailer has made a teak box, which he’d finished with Lemon Oil. He wanted to add some Microcrystalline Wax on top, would this be OK? Yes, wax can be put on top of Lemon Oil, but the second part of the question was whether another coat of Lemon Oil and then wax could be put on top, for future maintenance. This part was a no, the wax would have to be removed before putting more oil on, but it’s probably not worth the effort, just apply a little more wax straight on top of the existing coating and this should bring the shine back very quickly.

Finally for this week, a guitar maker using Hard Wax Oil was having trouble getting a bright gloss on his guitar. He’d applied two thinned coats, as we had suggested, and got a superb finish. He then applied another coat and it was patchy, could we advise? Having applied the thinned coats, we felt that it was time to start applying the oil undiluted, which he did and got the result he was looking for. What we didn’t know, is that the third, thinned coat, had been applied in very hot weather. Being thinner, it would have dried quicker, before the oil had chance to flow out properly, which could also have created the patchy problem. Extreme heat, and extreme cold, are not good finishing conditions.

And with that, I’m off. I’ll be back again next week as normal, and will let you know how the Weekender went. I’m sure it’s going to be great, do come and say hello if you’re there, it’s a very friendly event.

Have a great week

Terry