Spirit stains, sanding sealer and blutack...

Well, October has flown by....here we are at the end of British Summer Time, fireworks are going off sporadically in the area I live, and in a couple of days' time we'll have to take cover from the trick or treating marauders...

Today, I got time in my workshop and I decided to have a go at using blutack as a masking agent with spirit stains. I also decided to use the time to see what difference was made by using sanding sealer before applying the stains. The instructions say to use the stains on unsealed wood. For my experiment I sealed one half of the blank only. There were definitely some differences in the finish, as pictures will show later.

So, how is blutack a masking agent? I started by spraying the whole rim yellow, and then stuck lots of small blobs of blutack on the rim. Then I sprayed with orange. The blutack blobs were then either spread by squashing them down or by adding more blutack over the top - after the orange had had enough time to dry of course! Then the rim was sprayed with red. The blobs of blutack were spread a final time, and a last coat of black stain was airbrushed on.

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After letting it dry for some time, I then removed the blutack. I deliberately used vivid colours with lots of contrast between them, but I think subtler colour differences could be effective as well. Though, to be honest, I might not try this technique again as it was rather time-consuming!

So what about the sanding sealer? Well, it clearly made a difference. The unsealed half showed much more effect of the grain. The blank is ash, so the grain is very open anyway. I found I preferred the half that had been sealed as the stain gave a more even coverage.

The final pictures show that I should have waited a bit (perhaps more than a bit!) longer before sealing the stain. As it wasn't properly dry, I got runs in some places. Still, nothing too disastrous as this was a practice piece anyway. There's definitely some life in this idea if I can find the time to pursue it further. One thing I might do differently next time is to use plasticine instead of blutack  - I think plasticine might not be so sticky as the blutack.

Anyway, thanks for reading this and there' ll be a video of it posted in the next couple of days, if not sooner!

Left half is sealed, right half unsealed. You can see the grain much more clearly on the right-hand side...

Finally, thanks to Ed Oliver, Andrew Whale and John Clothier for sticker swaps!