French polish not sticking?

[Crooked Tree]

I am french polishing a piece of mahogany on an old piece of furniture. One patch does not seem to get polished - I can feel the polish all around but that bit seems to stay relatively smooth and polish free. Any ideas? I have tried sanding it back to the wood at that point usinf#g 60 grit, then 120, 180 and 800 wet & dry, used wet to avoid clogging (all I had after the 180). Might it just be the appearance of the grain at that point? It is on a curve.

 

[laird]

I feel a picture, and some more info might help (whilst realising the difficulty of photographing wood effects :!: ).
It could just be the visual effect of the curve, but :-
What polish ?, what was on before?, how did you remove/key it? how are you applying this finish?
Jumping grit from 180 to 800 is, IMVHO, several jumps too far.

 

[Crooked Tree]

Previous finish unknown owing to the age of the piece, but must be french polish underneath. It has probably had various waxes over the years, and I have previously used a brown Black Bison wax on it. I am applying Rustin's standard french polish (i.e. brown) using a rubber made from a piece of old cotton cloth over cotton wool - as normal. Preparation was a light sand all over, some patches having gone back to the wood whilst making the repair (several inches away from the patch in question). As mentioned, I have tried sanding this bit back to the wood.

I agree about the grit jump - all I had to hand.

 

[CHJ]

Any chance someone used a silicone based polish or wax on the piece in the past?

 

[Crooked Tree]

Anything is possible! It may be victorian and is nothing special, so it has probably experienced a lot over the years. However, I have sanded this patch back to the wood in case it is contaminated with something (like the araldite) used in the repair...

 

[laird]

Have you tried meths or white spirit on the offending area?, with (say) 0000 wire wool.

 

[maltrout512]

As laird mentioned wire wool but use meths not white spirit. White spirit will tend to darken the wood. Hope this helps.

 

[Crooked Tree]

Thank you. Might get some meths and give that a go. Meths is the solvent for French polish, though, so I may well put a bit more polish on then wax and see if it is livable, I am keen not to leave it looking completely different to the other bits of the piece by virtue of having no original finish left.

Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[Matt@]

French polish will stick to just about everything - you could french polish a metal dustbin lid if you wanted to...... Fill a rubber with neat french polish in the normal way and wipe once over the affected area, leave that for 15 minutes and repeat. leave another 15 minutes and repeat etc Once you have applied the polish half a dozen times in this way I would be amazed if the polish hasnt taken to the surface. The important thing is to just wipe over the surface one coat at a time - dont fiddle with it by going back over the surface as if you were frenching polishing ie moving the rubber around. Once you have built the bare area back up, leave it 24 hrs then flatten the whole surface with fine paper and continue french polishing in the normal way.

 

[Crooked Tree]

I have wondered with hindsight if I may have been over doing it a bit and removing previous coats by not leaving it long enough. I did in fact do something along the lines iof your suggestion before applying a brown wax polish. It is now good enough to pass a caual glance at least.