Making white maple to look as mahogany or walnut wood

Y.T. said:
Hi, Peter. How to make 50/50 shellac mix? I have shellac flakes and pure alcohol.
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Shellac is described by "cut" If you mix one pound of flakes with one gallon of alcohol that's a one-pound cut. And so on. I think to reproduce a 50-50 mixture you'd have to know what cut you were starting with - one pound, two pound etc.
 
I am just not sure how to proceed. I need very small quantity for modelling and I do not work with gallons so I did conversion for 1 pound cut. It appears that 1 gram of shellac flakes must be diluted in a bit over 8 milliliters of pure alcohol. So this is already 1:8 ratio or close to 13/87 in %.
 
I started mixing the solution. First time in my life. I do per ratio I described above. The solution is muddy. As I am reading from internet this means shellac has wax in it. Should I use shellac with wax on modelling parts is discard this and get dewaxed shellac?
 
It can be difficult to put other finishes over waxed shellac. And it looks cloudier than dewaxed
 
Y.T.
I just buy the commercial shellac in the small can from the hardware store ( or Amazon). (Zinsser brand, but any commercial brand will do.) You can get it either in blonde (clear) or amber. I use amber diluted with denatured alcohol for the color. Don't buy or decant large amounts as it doesn't keep for more than a year. Before using it as it comes out of the can I dilute it with denatured alcohol in even amounts. No need to decant your own unless you want to.
I never had much luck mixing my own from flake, never got the formula right.
The commercial stuff always worked out just fine. It also worked very well as a very thinned out sealer if allowed to dry thoroughly over night. I have used it as a sealer or French Polish finish for many years with no difficulty or blowback from antique furniture restoration customers.

Make things as uncomplicated and easy for yourself as possible in this regard. In more than forty years I have never had a problem unless the shellac had been on the shelf too long.

Van's remarks are perfectly valid. I just use the term "cut" to mean to dilute.

Pete
 
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Thanks, Peter. What are you applying the shellac with? You were mentioning some special swab. Parts I am dealing with are very small and often they are a glued together assemblies. I am concerned with uneven surface coverage especially in the inner corners of glued together parts.
 
I make very small applicators from old cotton cloth and you can use small brushes. Of course, there is always the problem of errant glue sealing the wood and resisting stain or finish color. this sometimes can be carefully scraped or sanded away or covered with a little opaque color. I'll send some pictures of a little pad and the type of commercial shellac. Since it doesn't take very much finish to do the job and it is very thin, not entirely sealing the wood, so as not to seal it against the glue, the parts may often best be finished first, then glued together. The final finish shouldn't' be glossy or impenetrably sealed as it won't look realistically in scale for mast and spar timbers if it is. The thinned shellac is very fast drying if applied in very thin coats, so that handling the pieces as you coat them is not much problem. Just leave ample time between coats to allow the parts to dry thoroughly in between. When the finished surface is no longer cool to the touch between coats it will be dry enough to handle and re-coat. You can do as many as three or for coats in one session before leaving the piece to dry overnight. many thin coats are always the best approach. Stop when you get the right look, matte or very satiny, not entirely sealed. With the amber shellac, even thinned, the color builds up pretty quickly.
 
Above are the supplies for the shellac finishing. I like the "Ken's" salad dressing bottle to contain the 50-50 mixture of amber shellac, as it has a nice applicator stopper with a small hole to dispense the mixture into the little cloth applicator. No need to soak the applicator, just get it thoroughly damp by placing the applicator (or"rubber") snugly over the little hole, turn the bottle upside down and shake just enough of the mixture into the rubber so that it becomes uniformly damp. The shellac can then be applied to the wood to be finished by wiping it gently over the surface, so that the shellac mixture is applied uniformly and smoothly with a light back and forth motion. I make the rubber with a small wad of cloth tightly bound inside a cover of the same soft cotton cloth (old worn-out T shirts are best) and tied off. You can make them any size for any surface, large enough to polish (finish) a tabletop to tiny enough for ship model spars. I also included a picture of a small brush for getting into the crooks and crannies.
You can also make a tinted version by adding a TINY amount of your alcohol based Stewmac stain to the mixture.
I keep my used rubbers in a tightly enclosed jar for future use. Even if they dry out they can be revived by dampening them with denatured alcohol.
Make some practice pieces first. You can develop a whole personalized technique for French polish finishing over time. It IS very personal, like painting techniques. You develop your own personal touch and stroke. This should be sufficient for coloring and finishing masts and spars made of maple to a satisfying tone and finish. Remember you can tint the mixture with your stain if you are VERY sparing with the stain. Experiment and creep up on it until you get what you want.
The color will intensify faster than you think with repeated applications.

Hope this proves useful to you (and anyone else who is interested). ;)
Regards,
Pete

PS for larger surfaces, a tiny dot of boiled linseed oil placed on the surface of the rubber will keep it moving smoothly and from getting stuck.
 
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Glad you can use it. Remember, the 50-50 mix is a rule of thumb. You can experiment with the alcohol to shellac ratio to see what suits you best. But shellac straight out of the can is too viscous for finishing. Experiment. Make test pieces. Finish the parts first, then glue them together if you can.
 
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