Oiling Meranti

[HRRLutherie]

Hi All,

I'm about to finish a meranti magnetic knife rack, and was planning on finishing it in linseed oil. Since it is an open grained wood (I think), do I need to fill it, and what grit should I sand to?

Thanks in advance,

Hugo

 

[HRRLutherie]

Anybody?

 

[Sgian Dubh]

Anybody?

Well, okay. There's no compelling reason to grain fill any open grained wood, except for such reasons as personal preference, an aid to performance in some way, and the desired appearance.

As you say meranti if a fairly coarse textured wood, so there's no real reason to sand beyond about 180 or 220 grit, assuming you've planed or scraped out any machining marks you don't wish to highlight. Beyond this sort of grit level the open pores of the wood are bigger than the abrasive grit.

After that, apply your finish of choice although I wouldn't normally choose something as soft and as marginally effective as linseed oil to create a protective barrier, especially in a kitchen. It works, but it's likely to white mark and spot a lot, and you may find you are compelled to repair the finish fairly regularly if you want to keep the knife block attractive. Something much tougher would be a wiped on oil (solvent) based varnish. To do this you thin the varnish with about 25- 30% white spirits and wipe on five to eight coats. Wipe on and buff off is the general routing. It usually takes about three coats before you see a film starting to build up. Stop building it up when you get the look you like. Slainte.

 

[HRRLutherie]

Thank you,

What do you think of finishing with Tru Oil? My only concern with varnish is that knife edges will be contacting the surface on a regular basis, and I thought that varnish was brittle.

 

[Sgian Dubh]

I don't know too much about Tru Oil, except that it's quite popular with instrument makers (such as yourself maybe[?]). From what I can gather it's basically linseed oil plus some other bits that make it tougher. It may well be suitable, but I'm not really qualified to say. Slainte.