I don't have any good before pictures of the table. The one thing that did turn out nicely is that all the scratches, marks, and water rings are gone. Maybe I am just being too much of a perfectionist on the finished product though. Since I don't have good before pictures, it's hard to tell if my complaints now were always problems. I should probably just assume they were and just be happy that its better than it was before refinishing it.
From afar, or at a glance when sitting at the table, it looks pretty nice. It turned out a little darker than it was originally, but I like the color. Here is a picture of the table:
One of my complaints about the way it turned out is that it appears that there are alternating light and dark streaks that look like I did a crappy job sanding. The leaves had the same effect after sanding them all the way down today, and I tried very hard to sand out the darker streaks but they would not go away. So, perhaps its just the pattern of the wood. Here is a top-view of the table where you can see the streaks I am talking about (click the picture for a larger version).
Another problem is that the table didn't turn out nearly as glossy as it was before. I am not sure this is absolutely necessary, but I was convinced I should have been able to achieve the same level of gloss. The picture below doesn't quite show the lack of gloss as well as I had hoped - plus I don't have a before picture to compare it to. But what you can see in this picture (at least in the larger version) is that it looks like there are splotches that turned out glossier than others. This kinda makes the table look like it is dirty or has sticky spill spots on it. This is probably the most irritating of the flaws I see. My guess is that I didn't get the excess teak oil wiped up very well. Here is a closer angled shot of the table top trying to show the varying gloss on the surface:
All in all I suppose it's not so bad considering that all the blemishes removed nicely and water beads up nicely on it now. Plus, it's better than the card table we had in it's place during the last two month while the table was in the garage. Laurie is just happy to have the table back.
If you're interested, here are the steps that were involved in refinishing the table:
- Sand off all finish on table top with 220 grit with random orbit sander.
- Apply teak oil, let it soak for 15 min, sand with 400 grit while still wet, wipe off excess.
- Wait 24 hours, repeat stain.
- Wait 2 months, repeat stain (this time without 400 grit sanding hoping for more gloss)
- Wait 24 hours.
- Apply Johnson Paste Wax. Wait 30 min to harden to a "haze" (whatever that means).
- Buff with terry cloth.
- Wait a few hours. Call it done.
- Skip staining anything other than the table top.
- Delegate cleaning the dust off the legs to Laurie.
4 comments:
It looks great in the pictures. It will be interesting to see the difference it makes on the leaves when you finish it in a few days. The uneven effect could be caused by actually waiting more than thirty minutes before wiping the first coat and waiting two months for the third. And probably not wiping with elbow grease. Did you buff before the wax? The color variation is the beauty of real wood rather than manufactured knock-offs.
I never let the stain soak for more than 15 minutes before wiping up the excess, and realistically it was more like 10 min because I was impatient. The can of teak oil says soak 5-15 min.
You're probably right about the lack of elbow grease. I kinda didn't clue in to treat it like stain, not paint, until the end, and I was wiping very delicately so as to not rub it off.
I didn't not buff before waxing. Only after.
You are a freak. The table looks awesome. Really.
If you want a nice gloss, reapply the wax with 0000 steel wool a couple of times, buffing to a shine with wet cheese cloth after each coat. You can use a car buffer if you like, but wax tends to dull to a warm sheen after time anyway.
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