Wood fillers

[cwearing]

Suggestions please on the selection of wood fillers to be used on elm and/or oak. Would like to have the filler contrast with a final finish of Watco Danish Oil Natural.

 

[Jack Savona]

My fillers

To answer your basic question: I tend to use primarily two wood fillers: fresh coffee and/or brass filings with thin CA.

For anyone interested, here's my process: I use a yard sale coffee grinder to really pulverize the coffee as well as the brass key filings (from the box store). The finer the powder the better the sanded finish. I vary the mix from just one of the fillers to a combination of varying proportions. I've come to like a touch of brass in the plain coffee. It offers some subtle highlights. The pure brass will polish to a "gold" inlay. Higher the grit, better the shine. Looks "rich" in a dark walnut.

Thin CA will harden either immediately. I layer the filler if the void has much depth. With the dust collector on a few inches away, I can avoid the fumes (often it smokes). To avoid an overrun of the CA with a subsequent stain on the wood, I use a paste wax on the surrounding area to avoid CA penetration.

For my finish I use Bush Oil (similar to Watco, but thicker) and like the results with these fillers.

Jack Savona

 

[DeanGThomas]

The pure brass will polish to a "gold" inlay. Higher the grit, better the shine. Looks "rich" in a dark walnut.

Does that high polish tarnish after a month or two?? If not, how do keep it shiny?

 

[Charlie Knighton]

Ca

To avoid an overrun of the CA with a subsequent stain on the wood, I use a paste wax on the surrounding area to avoid CA penetration.

i have bought oil in a syringe type dispenser (for fishing reels) has anyone seen CA in a syringe type dispenser that does not clog and the amount used can be better controled or has multiple tips that can be cleaned

also, would one sand the paste wax away after before finishing?

 

[tdrice]

I do the same thing as Jack except for using powdered brass. I have never had the brass tarnish. I think it is probably a combination of the CA and whatever finish is on the piece. If the Oxygen can't get to the brass it won't tarnish.
Other contrasting finishes thati I use are turquoise and coral. I intend to try Inlace but haven't yet.
Terence

 

[john lucas]

I use shoe polish and then put some shellac over that to seal it. Sometimes I finish the wood first with a thin layer and then rub in the shoe polish. different look either way. I also like to use a product called Rub-n-buff which is a kind of wax but comes in gold, copper, and silver.
If you don't mind sanding almost any somewhat thin paint will color the pores as well as the wood. Sand off the high surface and you have colored pores.
If you want 2 colors, put the thin paint on to color the pores (not fill them) then use an ink brayer and printers ink to roll on the outside surface. This will color the high spots and leave the low spots as they are.

 

[Petteri Leppikallio]

Beeswax crayon works well too with oil finish. Oil surface well, lathe running aply crayon lightly and with oily rag friction heat and polish the crayon. Color will leave surface except the pores. It is possible to color entire surface with this crayons too if more color is aplied.

 

[Mark Mandell]

If we're speaking about pore filling rather than void-filling, the "traditional" material has been liming wax. This is paste wax with added white pigment that is rubbed into the surface of open/ring-porous woods like oak,ash, walnut, and mahogony, allowed to dry, and then rubbed off with cross-grain strokes leaving the white accents in the pores and annular rings. It's most effective on face grain, end-grain resulting in mostly just dots. The Rub-n-Buff products are the same concept, although designed to give a faux metallic finish. The issue that arises is that it's a wax surface which will go dull before long (although the color will remain). For best, as in "most durable," use, the wax should be sealed with a coating to retain a desired sheen.

 

[MichaelMouse]

I save tips from bottles of CA with various-sized openings, cleaning them with an acetone soak. If I require a different opening, I remove the existing and put on one appropriate to the flow rate I desire. The bottle is squeezeable enough to use it as a syringe. Clever packaging means not all tips will fit all bottles, so save your old ones for possible re-use as the CA is used up. They also sell add-on tips which fit some bottles, and they can be soaked and re-used as well.

An irrigation syringe might work for injecting thicker CA if the rubber piston seal doesn't react with the CA solvent. I use them for glue and oiling bushings. Imagine you can get them without prescription at a pharmacy, though I get mine at the hospital.

Fillers, and here I'm going to assume, as Mark has from the woods in question, that he means pore fillers, can be purchased and tinted as desired by using artist oil color for oil-based, and water-soluble colors for things like Durham's water putty or plaster of Paris. They should be wiped on along the grain to work them in, be left to set a bit, then carefully wiped across the grain so as not to pull them back out. Standard woodworking procedure, easily searched. Sand and finish with appropriate finishes.

If he means crack fillers, it's tough to beat bark for a natural look yet one which contrasts with the wood. I cut slivers and wedge them into cracks after first putting thicker CA in place. Keeps the bark from absorbing a lot of CA and giving that dead fish eye look you can get with sawdust fills. You can pick from whatever bark varieties are on hand, but cherry, with its easily removed thin sections provides a good dark fill, the bast portion of basswood underbark can be tamped in like oakum, and is lighter in color.

 

[Gretch Flo]

ground fine enuf

To answer your basic question: I tend to use primarily two wood fillers: fresh coffee and/or brass filings with thin CA.

For anyone interested, here's my process: I use a yard sale coffee grinder to really pulverize the coffee as well as the brass key filings (from the box store). The finer the powder the better the sanded finish. I vary the mix from just one of the fillers to a combination of varying proportions. I've come to like a touch of brass in the plain coffee. It offers some subtle highlights. The pure brass will polish to a "gold" inlay. Higher the grit, better the shine. Looks "rich" in a dark walnut.
Jack Savona

I have used my coffee grinder for both instant coffee (only kind I use at home) and bark per suggestions from a previous thread, (thank you forum!!). I couldn't get it real fine. Then tried my blender. Still couldn't- Any secrets? Gretch

 

[Mark Mandell]

I have used my coffee grinder for both instant coffee (only kind I use at home) and bark per suggestions from a previous thread, (thank you forum!!). I couldn't get it real fine. Then tried my blender. Still couldn't- Any secrets? Gretch

mortar and pestile?
donkey and millstone?
14 Spanish maids wearing stone slippers?

 

[Gretch Flo]

mortar and pestile?
donkey and millstone?
14 Spanish maids wearing stone slippers?

Actually I have a mortar and pestle-will give it a try. Probably cleaner and easier than the other suggestions!!! Gretch