Post #585458 by TheBigT on Mon, Apr 18, 2011 12:03 PM

On 2011-04-15 20:40, congatiki wrote:
Greetings Poobah, Amate and McTiki, appreciate your nice compliments about the latest carve.
No problem sharing my techniques Amate...pretty simple...time consuming...but generally produces
nice results.
A venerable carver, someone named Ben, has posted about staining, sanding, staining, sanding, and
so forth. His stuff always turns out pretty nice so I have started putting a little more effort
into the staining process.

On this carving I started with a coat of a stain called "special walnut"...which was a little more
brown than a typical walnut stain. I sanded off as much of the stain as I could without going crazy,
leaving some dark crevices (such as the deep carved areas around the nose...eyes...etc.) Then a
second coat of the same stain...repeated stain seems to show more grain and create a little
translucence to the whole thing...excuse my explanation...have had a few cocktails tonight.)
After sanding off the stain a second time I switched to "walnut" stain which is quite a bit darker
than the special walnut. That gave me the general color that I wanted...along with some nice
grain and the darker accents around the eyes and facial features. Then...three coats of
tung oil...each one giving the carving a little more character. Tung oil gives the project a nice
"glow" without being shiney.

The stain/sand/stain/sand/stain process gives the finished produce a "glassy" look that is
pretty cool in real life...a little hard to capture in a photograph. There is a depth that I have
not been able to achieve with a single coat of stain. Basswood is wonderful to carve but can be
a bit blotchy if you don't take the time to finish it properly. But...as Jackie Mason would say...
I don't know.

At any rate...I appreciate all positive comments...they keep me going when I wonder what it all
means.

Fantastic piece of art, Conga! Killer job. I love it. I also find our staining method interesting. I see your pics where you have sanded after a coat of stain but left places where the stain is still fairly untouched. How long are you waiting between coats for the stain to dry (or how long is it taking, rather)? You can actually stain right over an existing coat of stain. The linseed oil will finally cure, but the wait may be a while. Are you finding it slow to dry when you coat over the patches with a lot of the pre-existing stain still left? I'm assuming you're using oil based stain?