A guy gave me some walnut blocks (high grade wood but not "stabilized"). What do you use to treat the wood to make it suitable for a seat? Anything I can get at Home Depot?

If you do a search on this board for "stabilized wood" you will find at least 2 pages of topics about the pro's & con's of stabilizing wood.

I've seen several methods for stabilizing wood at home but each method suffered from one problem - You need to generate a great deal of pressure. So every technique I've seen was either too superficial or had the possibility of blowing up your garage.

Check out [www.stabilizedwood.com] They do a great job, very quick, and nice people to work with.

Christian



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/07/2005 10:59PM by Christian Brink.

I run across this product at Cue Components today.
[cuecomponents.com]
Claims to stabilize wood without pressure. Nelsonite. Does anybody out there have any experience with this product? If it's good enough for pool cues it should work on reel seats and handles.
Thanks, Chris

What about some type of finnish? put into a vacuum packer bag and vacuum pack it and let it soak for a few days??

Some points to consider with stabilizing wood:

1) Not all species are compatible with (or require) stabilization. Many tropical exotic hardwoods contain a high percentage of extractives, oils, and minerals which may not work well with with stabilization. Typically the problem is incompatibility between the wood's natural extractives and the stabilization resins.

2) The good news is that many incompatible woods do not require stabilization for durability. These woods may include members of the Rosewood family, Cedars, Ebony. Among native species, Walnut, Redwood, and Western Red Cedar are not compatible with most stabilization processess. However, note that stabilization, in addition to enhancing the durability of wood, also minimizes the inherent dimensional instability of wood. This is accomplished by displacing open spaces in the pores and vascular system in wood grain, preventing migration and absorbtion of water. Exotics which do not require or are incompatible with stbilization may have varying degrees of dimensional stability.

3) The most effective way to accomplish stabilization is by use of a vaccum as opposed to pressure. Pressure methods do work, but typically are limited in the depth of penetration of the stabilization solution. Vaccum methods remove all available air inside of the wood, and then the solution is introduced to the wood under vaccum. This process allows for complete penetration for most wood vascular models, diffuse porous as well as ring porous.

4) You can accomplish as very effective stabilizing process at home by using Tung oil, but it is time consuming, and involves repeated applications. Tung Oil is compatible with all tropical and exotic wood species I am aware of. Tung oil is applied , soaked and rubbed off in a process similar to use of "Tru-Oil". Immersing endgrain in the Tung oil will, after several applications, result in a completely sealed wood. This process is more time intensive for woods with pronounced grain and larger pores, like Walnut and Rosewoods. Catilization of the finish is greatly accelerated by sunlight and uv light. This acceleration of course, does not apply to internal areas. I recommend that wood stabilized (end grain soaking) with this process be allowed to cure for at least 10 days in warm weather, or you could see weeping of uncured finish.

[www.northcoastknives.com]


If you blow yourself into the next zip-code, don't blame me!


Andy Dear
Lamar Reel Seats