Post by: ridjrunr on April 07, 2014, 11:09:16 PM
These two plugs where turned the same day from the same block of cherry.
The darker one was put in an empty coffee can that had about 1/4 cup of ammonia in it.
It was resting above the liquid on a plastic shot cup from cough syrup. I had the lid on the coffee can and let it set like this for 24 hrs.
The other one is just sanded bare cherry,nothing on it. After airing out the fumed one for a few days, I will put the same finish on both of these to compare. Pretty interesting so far.
Post by: Roaddog on April 08, 2014, 08:43:48 AM
Post by: Kermit on April 08, 2014, 11:22:33 AM
Post by: ridjrunr on April 08, 2014, 11:56:40 AM
I think the article I had read referred to doing it on gunstocks and furniture in days past.
Post by: Kermit on April 08, 2014, 12:25:16 PM
Post by: Captchee on April 09, 2014, 07:33:48 AM
to answer the question you sent me , i had to read the thread first as i wasnt sure what your were talking about
so yes i have used cherry a couple of times . I tried fuming a couple times but it seemed to me the result was that the gas worked better in in the more open grain areas then in the tighter grain in other words I found it rather blotchy . But then I to was using store bought ammonia.
I also tried the industrial. Well lets say commercial grade ammonia as Kermit suggested as its still not the strongest ammonia you can buy. Wont do that again LOL but it did do a much better job . However the areas ranged again from light to very dark which when finished was almost black .
I just don’t like the ammonia fumes. but as you can see , it works .
I ended up going the Lye application route , then adding a little stain after. The thing to remember about cherry is that there are lots of different types of cherry .
Also keep in mind the figure can range from none to Burl. But also remember that with smaller pieces like your using that figure isn’t really going to be real desirable unless your using a very tight burled wood . Where in larger , longer pieces the figure can be readily seen as your have more area
I think the figure one gets depends on the cherry the plank was cut from . I also think that how well a lye treatment works , depends on that as well .
cherry will also darken with age as well as change color with the finishing oils you chose . So keep that in minds as the brown you see now , may very well not be the finished color .
Here is a build I did some years ago from a Bing cherry plank . Lye didnt give as dark and deep red as I wanted so I followed up with an alcohol based stain
(http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y242/captchee/gun%20stock%20artical/storm005.jpg)
(http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y242/captchee/gun%20stock%20artical/storm007.jpg)
also here is a link to a discussion we had some years ago over on the ALRF concerning lye on cherry . you will see more photos of the above rifle as well as other folks guns . IE you will see how the color changes depending on the type of Cherry
. anyway i hope it helps you some .
http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=9070.0
Post by: ridjrunr on April 09, 2014, 02:42:52 PM
This morning I took both plugs and put them back on the lathe and steel wooled them as the fumed one did develope whiskers.Then heated the plugs with hot air from my heat gun and the applied Johnson's paste wax while spinning. I feel the wood soaked some wax into the grain so I did this 4 times.This is the result.
I understand that sunlight and time does basically the same thing. Much like a custom recurve I own,made of bocote ,it is much darker today than when I had it built in 97.
Post by: Kermit on April 09, 2014, 11:41:20 PM
I worked at the end of my woodworking carreer as a craftsman for a custom furniture designer who did a lot of Shaker and Greene & Greene style furniture, much of it in cherry. For a while we responded to customers who wanted instant age by applying oil (I don't recall the brand) to the cherry prior to spraying the catalyzed lacquer finish. We eventually gave that up, in favor of allowing the customer to experience the same ageing and color change that folks would have seen back in the day.
I think that is the way to do it. That said, I have a smoothrifle in cherry that was stained to mimic age. Funny that the maker needed to do that to the wood but did not apply the same ethic to the metal--brass bright and steel freshly browned. I like it anyway.
Post by: ridjrunr on April 10, 2014, 02:48:20 AM
Just so happens these are a couple of pcs turned out of one of the scrap chunks you sent me a couple of yrs ago.The scraps from your garage(thanks again)
I wasn't so much wanting to age it or make it look old, as much as I wanted to darken it and it seems the wipe on stains get it too dark. Fuming gave me pretty much what I wanted,and the shade I like.
This will be going on a new powder horn and it will look new,not artificially aged.
The artificial aging you touched on is done a lot nowadays,to guns,horns, and other accoutrements. Sometimes tastefully done,but done too often IMO.
Post by: Captchee on April 10, 2014, 07:52:04 AM
I often wonder however when such discussion come up , if we seem to lose track of they what and why wood often achieved the colors they did .
What im getting at here is for lack of a better description , let me call it environmental conditions .
Remember there was no electricity either for heat or lighting . As such you have wood smoke candle and oil soot . In some cases depending on the shop even coal oil soot and in many cases tobacco smoke .
I don’t know if you recall the old black smith shop that was over in New Plymouth or for that mater if you had ever been in there or if you realized that at one time it was also a a wood working shop . If not , its IMO note worthy that the whole shop was experimented with the smell of coal and kerosene .
I never really considered how that effected the products being turned out of a shop tell I quite smoking the first time and realized just how much the colors of the wood in my home had changed . later when I started smoking a pipe I began to notice just how much the wood in my shop had changed in color and how quickly it happened .
One would also think because we sand or cut back into new wood when we do a project , that the newly exposed wood is effected . But the reality I think is that not only is the wood effected , but its also stimulated to some existent by ourselves as we to have that same contaminants within our bodies, in the oils and acids in our skin. All of which can effect what something looks like especially if we are not careful in our finish work .
Ie the different color one can sometimes see if an oil finish is applied by hand without protective gloves vs. one that been applied without and contact “spry type finish “ or one that’s been applied and hand rubbed with some type of applicator
I also think possibly we should not confuse artificial aging with the stimulation of colors.
While I cant speak to furniture , I can speak to gun work . In that work we know that stocks often times had types of stains added to them . In some cases to in hence grain or color . In others to cover it up as in the case with painted stocks .
still other times the colors we see are from age or the use of oils which quickly change the woods color when contaminants are introduced . Hence the patina we see on stock which BL or wax has been used .