A friend is trying to stain his own kitchen cabinets. (His family bailed out on him.) He is using a Minwax polyurethane stain which is going on ok on the flat sections but bulking up in corners and around edges and such. He says it is oil based and he is using an oil based poly brush.
Normally I stain and then poly, if I poly at all. I need suggestions on the best way to remedy his problem, preferably using the stain he already has purchased. Would it be better to rag it on? Or thin it? Ay suggestions welcome.
My 'sperience w/ it tells me I'd never use it again...I've use a lot of Minwax original oil stain and the old original oil finish and you can do very good job w/ it but the hybrid product is just a disaster imo.
My daughter/SIL started it on some kitchen cabinets of theirs and similar problems -- best I ever managed was to thin it significantly and use it as a wiping varnish to get a uniform color. Then buffed it w/
400 wet/dry using it dry to get a little scratch and used a different poly clear varnish for topcoat--don't recall now which. End result not great but ok considering the starting point and the sorry base cabinets they were to begin with, anyway...but it was a lot more work than would have needed to fixup the mess the first coat left.
What he has is varnish with color in it: a "toner". Ideally, varnish should be flowed on in a fairly thick coat but one has the exercise some restraint in the amount. It also needs to be applied evenly. If it isn't even, brush it out.
When I varnish I apply a brush load, tip out the sides of the applied area and start the next brush load ahead of where I stopped with the previous; it is then dragged back to #1 then ahead to new area, then edges tipped. Et cetera
For corners, he would do well to do them the same way one cuts in an edge when painting; i.e., hold the brush at an angle and sort of push a small amount into the edge with the brush tip and drag it along; when the brush tip is depleted, roll the brush a bit more toward 90 degrees. Easy to do, hard to explain.
_ANY_ of this particular product is too much.. :( :)
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This particular product is one I cannot understand how it ever got introduced and how it survives on the market--only the inertia of the Minwax name keeps it afloat I think.
It is an _extremely_ difficult to flow product and doesn't suit well to flowing out w/ even a good quality brush--it gets tacky almost immediately.
Don't ever try it thinking it's a saver of time over the two-step process if you want anything at all controllable in how it turns out other than, perhaps, a large flat table top.
I wasn't there for the staining attempt, but surprisingly most of the stain went on evenly. However ... yes, here it come ... absolutely no prep was done.
He purchased bare cabinets from Lowe's and installed them, unstained. Now he is trying to stain them in place, no sanding, no conditioner, no other prep at all. He is upset because it's dripping and running. Hmm, I wonder why?
I don't get it. Is everyone really that lazy? No prep, no protection to the floor? New appliances in the way?
This kitchen is about ten square feet with a new large fridge and stove halfway out from the walls where they will eventually sit. He removed one door, laid it across other bare cabinets, and tried staining one flat and ended up dripping and splashing.
I'm suddenly feeling extremely old and cranky. I can't fathom why anyone would want to not put in the amount of effort required to do a job right they first time. If I had to live with the cabinets, you can be sure they'd be as perfect as possible. Guess I am crazy?
Oh, and no sanding what so ever. I ran my fingers across a few doors and damn near came away with several splinters. I was a little surprised they were so rough from the store but then again not, considering they probably expect the buyer to do that work. I couldn't live with 50 grit cabinets.
I have a feeling peeps are going to try and talk me into doing this project, and frankly I don't want to. There is almost no room to move let alone work, and with as bad as my current physical ailments have been acting up this winter, I'm in no mood to make them worse by climbing all around and over these things. Guess I'm selfish too?
Would it be better to rag it on? Or thin it? Ay suggestions
You can get beautiful results with this stuff but you have to brush it on p erfectly. Any overlap and you have uneven results. If he really wants to do it, he could thin it some with mineral spirits and also keep a can of spir its to dip the brush to keep it open a bit longer when he needs to brush ou t the inconsistencies.
However, I would suggest the best solution at this point is to select his f avorite color of interior gloss or semi-gloss latex.
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