Filling holes & repairing pallet wood

[LouHolme]

Hi. I use a lot of pallet wood and after I have taken the pallets to pieces, a lot of the wood has nail or screw holes in. I normally either use a countersink drill and then fill with a plug, or for smaller holes just mix some sawdust with Gorilla Wood glue then sand when dry. I’ve just seen on TV that one lady said she fills holes in drift wood with ‘powdered glue and sawdust’? I’ve looked on line but reviews for powdered glue seem mixed with many saying it’s ok for glueing but not filling - can I ask what people in here use to repair wood and fill screw holes? TIA

 

[Phil Pascoe]

https://www.toolstation.com/everbuild-high-performance-wood-filler-500g/p34056
the colour of your choice.

 

[TheUnicorn]

what sort of finish are you looking to get, for pallet wood I'd have said the holes, knocks, damage is part of the charm so I'd be looking to heighten it with something like black epoxy

 

[Jacob]

Linseed oil putty. Takes a long time to fully harden but easy to apply and dirt cheap.

 

[Dhenry]

I’ve been doing a project recently recycling some french oak pallets. I used two part epoxy mixed with a little black food dye to fill the holes/defects. Has worked pretty well and fairly convenient/quick to use.

 

[robgul]

what sort of finish are you looking to get, for pallet wood I'd have said the holes, knocks, damage is part of the charm so I'd be looking to heighten it with something like black epoxy

That would be my take on using pallet wood too . . . most of the stuff I make from pallets just has quick superficial go over with the random orbital sander to smooth out the grain a bit and that's it (and sometimes a coat of cheapest water-based clear varnish to seal the surface)

 

[Owd Jockey]

Depending on the wood, size of hole and 'piece'. I use various methods. The most common for small voids is to apply very fine sawdust and apply CA glue, building up the layers. For larger pieces I use instant Epoxy Resin ( I used to use Gorilla but Everbuild Rapid Epoxy from Toolstation is much cheaper), depending on the piece I add a few drops of colour. I have used on some occassions Milliput.