Grain Filler

[Bill21]

Anyone used Black grain filler on Ash? Normally I’d seal the wood first then apply but I recently saw a video of Snooker Cues being made and it was applied directly to the bare wood. The affect was extremely good.

[Paul Hannaby]

Yes, I've done it before with black wax and with acrylic paint. Both work

[Bill21]

Did you use a sealer first?

[Twisted Trees]

Did you use a sealer first?

As a general rule don't use sealer for dye or products that need to soak  into the wood, e.g. oils. Do use sealer for paint or other products that coat the wood e.g. wax.

Obviously generally general rules are for breaking 

[Paul Hannaby]

Yes use a sealer before applying the grain filler.

[Wooddust]

Paul a bit confused your two posts on this subject appear to contradict each other.

[Twisted Trees]

Paul a bit confused your two posts on this subject appear to contradict each other.

No they don't paint or wax require sanding sealer as they sit on top of the wood, stain and oil are the ones that soak in so don't want sanding sealer

[Paul Hannaby]

That depends on the paint - some don't need a sanding sealer but where grain fills are concerned, yes, the surface of the wood should be sealed prior to applying the grain filler (whether that's wax, paint or whatever).

[Wooddust]

OK I am more confused now

[Paul Hannaby]

Look at it this way - if you are applying a grain filler whether it's wax, paint or anything else the objective is to colour the pores in the wood but not the rest of the surface so you would use a sealer which would allow the excess filler to be removed from the surface without colouring it

[Bill21]

Look at it this way - if you are applying a grain filler whether it's wax, paint or anything else the objective is to colour the pores in the wood but not the rest of the surface so you would use a sealer which would allow the excess filler to be removed from the surface without colouring it

This is the “normal” approach. I started this thread though because in a video I saw recently Black grain filler was applied directly to bare wood. The effect seemed much better than usual. I suspect because using sealer first actually fills some of the grain before the filler can get in. Wiping off the excess filler didn’t seem to cause any problems and I couldn’t see any “staining”, just nicely filled pores.

[Twisted Trees]

Look at it this way - if you are applying a grain filler whether it's wax, paint or anything else the objective is to colour the pores in the wood but not the rest of the surface so you would use a sealer which would allow the excess filler to be removed from the surface without colouring it

This is the “normal” approach. I started this thread though because in a video I saw recently Black grain filler was applied directly to bare wood. The effect seemed much better than usual. I suspect because using sealer first actually fills some of the grain before the filler can get in. Wiping off the excess filler didn’t seem to cause any problems and I couldn’t see any “staining”, just nicely filled pores.

As I said above "Obviously generally, general rules are for breaking"

It will depend on many factors what wood? What humidity is the workshop? How does that compare to the moisture level in the blank? What was the sanding level? Was it burnished?

One of the nice things with working with an organic medium is experimentation is constant. 

[Bill21]

Ash, seasoned.

[Paul Hannaby]

Before starting you have to remember to take Paul's law into account -

The complexity of any process is proportional to the cube of the number of people involved in defining the process