Soft beeswax polish recipe.

[Rorschach]

Since my bottle of turpentine has turned itself into gum turpentine and is no longer very useful as a solvent I am thinking the best thing to do is use it in a polish. I have plenty of beeswax on hand that is also not doing anything useful. Often find it cheap at car boot sales.

I will be want to use the polish for various things, on tools, bare wood, leather, shoes etc so I want it to be very soft and easy to apply with a stiff brush, something probably a little softer than Ren wax which is what I mostly use now, not quite a "cream" though as I never liked that kind of polish.

So recommendations for a recipe please. Oh and I do have a little grade A carnauba hanging around as well.

 

[custard]

So recommendations for a recipe please. Oh and I do have a little grade A carnauba hanging around as well.

You're far better off brewing up a hard wax than a soft wax. Making your own soft wax gives you very little advantage over Briwax, Black Bison, etc. But a proper hard wax is very difficult to buy commercially and is chalk and cheese compared to a soft wax. A hard wax can be buffed up to a much higher gloss and never feels "tacky" in the hand.

If it's so good why doesn't every one use it? The answer is ease of application, a hard wax needs applying very thinly and then buffing out at just the right time. Too soon and you'll take it all off, too long and it sets very hard and becomes an awful lot of work to flatten off and burnish up to a gloss. But time it right (practise makes perfect), buff for England, and you'll get a finish that's closer to french polish than to most people's normal experience with waxes.

Amongst old school restorers there's a common view that shellac wax is superior to carnauba for a hard wax, but I've used them both and can see very little practical difference. You need about one part carnauba to about four parts beeswax (add much more carnauba than this and it becomes just too difficult to apply, one to three is pretty much the absolute limit) then about the same volume of turps or perhaps a bit less. Melt the carnauba first as it has a much higher melting point. DO NOT USE A NAKED FLAME OR ELECTRIC RING, you need to cobble together a bain marie type arrangement.

Where do microcrystalline waxes fit into the spectrum you may ask? They're not really any harder or glossier than regular waxes, but their whole reputation is built on one single attribute, microcrystalline waxes are acid free so restorers prefer them if they'll be waxing over metal furniture fittings which any other wax will eventually tarnish. That's the reason microcrystalline waxes get the "museum endorsement", not because they're superior as waxes.

Good luck!

 

[Rorschach]

I was actually thinking of making something very much along the lines of briwax etc, I know I can go buy it easily, but I have all the ingredients on hand and they will just sit there otherwise so it seemed sensible.

 

[ED65]

I was curious whether you meant a soft-wax finish or a soft wax finish. I see it's the latter and that is one of the best reasons to make up your own version of commercial finishes IMO. That and the saving in dosh needless to say

Recipes vary all over the shop for this kind of thing, some using exotics and now-obsolete/hard-to-obtain harder ingredients, but just the carnauba is usually enough and was the choice for commercial waxes until fairly recently. You can add a little carnauba to take a plain beeswax polish up one notch in hardness to the level where it won't easily fingerprint, to a blend much heavier in harder wax(es) for a really tough polish that'll take more handling before wearing through and better resist dust damage.

Here are a few formulas that I've read just recently.

Bull wax
Mix something like 2-3 parts of beeswax, 1 part of carnuaba and 1 part of candelilla wax in the double boiler.
Remove from heat, stir in turpentine - about three times as much as there is wax.

Shiny, but hard work. [might be best retained for where power buffing will be used]

Cream polish
Melt together:
12 parts carnauba wax
7 parts Japan wax
3 parts paraffin wax
(a good beeswax can be substituted for the Japan + paraffin wax component)

Dissolve in about the same quantity of turpentine to form paste. Stir well and add in a little ammonia.

Glossy wax polish
Melt 3 parts beeswax with 1 part carnauba wax.
Remove from heat, stir in 3 parts of turpentine.

About consistency, I presume you know this already but any formula for paste wax can be weighted towards the spirits or turpentine to make it softer at room temperature. Although I think many prefer something stiffer than this these days a number of old guides give a recommendation for the consistency when cold to be "that of butter in the summertime".

In case you're interested you can also colour any wax polish with the addition of dry pigment powders, or more commonly these days, a little oil paint. You don't need much. The standard earth colours are all potentially useful for a variety of natural wood shades and for ageing effects, you could consider a basic list to be Raw Sienna, Burnt Sienna, Raw Umber, Burnt Umber and Van Dyke Brown. For anything paler than Raw Sienna would be useful on just the uncoloured wax will suffice.

 

[Rorschach]

Some very useful info there. Thank you.
I think I might go for a very basic mix with just a touch of carnauba and stay shy on the turps, easy to remelt and add a bit more I guess.

 

[Inoffthered]

I make my own beeswax polish. I used to melt the wax in a bain marie and then add the turpentine but the potential for a major conflagration caused me to reconsider the production method.
The method I use now is to grate the beeswax using a coarse cheese grater (special purchase from Poundland or similar). Put the grated wax into a glass container and add the turpentine to a level just below the surface of the wax. Put a lid on the container and leave for a day or so. Shake or stir occasionally.
The ingredients meld into a paste and you can add more wax if the consistency is too sloppy or add more turpentine if it is too stiff.

I now tend to make up polish as and when needed.

I find the best polish comes from wax taken from the cappings from the honey extraction process.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

That won't work with carnauba (or m/c) in the mix, though.

 

[ED65]

...stay shy on the turps, easy to remelt and add a bit more I guess.

Yes, and some old guides give advice on doing exactly that if you find that once set it's a bit stiffer than you like. I think these days there's often a "oh well, I'll make the next batch the way I want it" kind of attitude, you see this a lot on the cooking forums and art forums, but that's just giving up too early. I think life's too short to be slowly using up stuff you made yourself that isn't just so, the way you set out to make it!

If I were unsure of the consistency it was going to end up I'd much prefer to go the other way though. Here's why: you can leave the cap off and it will become stiffer all on its own with no further intervention, saving time and hassle.

 

[custard]

That won't work with carnauba

+1

Maybe carnauba will dissolve given weeks or months, but for all practical purposes you need heat. In fact, if you're including carnauba, melt that first then add everything else.

 

[custard]

Cream polish
Melt together:
12 parts carnauba wax
7 parts Japan wax
3 parts paraffin wax
(a good beeswax can be substituted for the Japan + paraffin wax component)

Dissolve in about the same quantity of turpentine to form paste. Stir well and add in a little ammonia.

This sounds pretty unusable to me. Weird that it's called "cream polish"; "concrete polish" would be a more accurate description!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Just to be clear - I assume everyone's talking of turpentine and not turps substitute or white spirit?

 

[ED65]

White spirit or turpentine can be used interchangeably in this sort of thing Phil. There's little difference between them when used as a solvent for wax, other than in evaporation rate (and then not enough to be significant, although I'm sure someone will disagree with this).

 

[memzey]

The smell is different of course. I much prefer the smell of turps myself to white spirit. I haven’t got round to making my own but keep meaning to. Would using an induction hob obviate the need for a double boiler arrangement?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Probably not - the pan would possibly get hotter than the flash point of the turps. I do mine in a jam jar in a pan of water (with the lid loose).

 

[Rorschach]

Well I finally got around to trying a mix today, we'll see how it works out. I tried to keep it on the smaller side for testing but as usual I totally over estimated and now have a jam jar full . Turns out 220g of ingredients is a lot bigger than expected.

Here is the recipe I used, based on info here and some googling:

20g Carnauba
80g Beeswax
120g Turps

As per custards instructions I melted the carnauba first then added the beeswax a couple of teaspoons at a time. Turned off the gas and then added the turps stirring until it was almost clear again. Now letting it cool.

I originally only added 100g of turps but could see from the texture as it cooled on my stirring stick that it would be too firm, so I quickly stirred in another 20g. I am hoping for something the consistency of softish butter that I can wipe or brush on.

 

[nabs]

I made some too - 1 part carnauba, 5 parts beeswax melted in a bain marie and then topped up with the same volume again using 50/50 turps and white spirit.

The result is quite hard and needs a reasonably rough cloth to get out of the jar (an inside-out sports sock was just the ticket!) - it buffs to a glossier finish that what I was using before (50/50 beeswax and turps) and a little goes a long way. This small jar will probably outlast me

 

[Rorschach]

Ok well that mix cooled and while it was easy to get out of the jar as soon as I started to spread it on a test piece I realised it was very hard to spread thinly, testing on my bandsaw table was even worse as the cold metal made it go even harder. Not what I was looking for.

Adapting the recipe to another I saw online that called for double the turps to wax I re-melted my mix and added another 80g(ish) of turps so it is a now a 2:1 turps wax blend. We will see how this hardens up.

 

[custard]

Well I finally got around to trying a mix today, we'll see how it works out. I tried to keep it on the smaller side for testing but as usual I totally over estimated and now have a jam jar full . Turns out 220g of ingredients is a lot bigger than expected.

Here is the recipe I used, based on info here and some googling:

20g Carnauba
80g Beeswax
120g Turps

As per custards instructions I melted the carnauba first then added the beeswax a couple of teaspoons at a time. Turned off the gas and then added the turps stirring until it was almost clear again. Now letting it cool.

I originally only added 100g of turps but could see from the texture as it cooled on my stirring stick that it would be too firm, so I quickly stirred in another 20g. I am hoping for something the consistency of softish butter that I can wipe or brush on.

If you want a slushy wax (i.e. like Briwax), then carnauba shouldn't really feature in the recipe. More turps will help, but you'll always be battling against the carnauba. As Nabs pointed out, using carnauba rewards you with a much higher level of gloss (plus it doesn't feel tacky when handled), the price you pay is less easy application.

You pays your money and you makes your choice.

 

[Rorschach]

Well I finally got around to trying a mix today, we'll see how it works out. I tried to keep it on the smaller side for testing but as usual I totally over estimated and now have a jam jar full . Turns out 220g of ingredients is a lot bigger than expected.

Here is the recipe I used, based on info here and some googling:

20g Carnauba
80g Beeswax
120g Turps

As per custards instructions I melted the carnauba first then added the beeswax a couple of teaspoons at a time. Turned off the gas and then added the turps stirring until it was almost clear again. Now letting it cool.

I originally only added 100g of turps but could see from the texture as it cooled on my stirring stick that it would be too firm, so I quickly stirred in another 20g. I am hoping for something the consistency of softish butter that I can wipe or brush on.

If you want a slushy wax (i.e. like Briwax), then carnauba shouldn't really feature in the recipe. More turps will help, but you'll always be battling against the carnauba. As Nabs pointed out, using carnauba rewards you with a much higher level of gloss (plus it doesn't feel tacky when handled), the price you pay is less easy application.

You pays your money and you makes your choice.

This may mean that I will have to make a version 2 with no carnauba, but if so it's not too much of a problem, both would find applications in the workshop I am sure.

 

[custard]

both would find applications in the workshop I am sure.

+1

You're right, they each perform different functions.