Staining Maple

Ok, first off, I hate staining maple. Not because it's difficult but I generally want maple to look, well like maple. But, I've made some floor thresholds out of hard maple and now need to match them to the hardwood floors. I was planning on using dyes to get to the color match. But in my limited experience with staining, I see maple blotches pretty badly. What do you all recommend to avoid this? I see wood conditioner and I can always mix up some shellac as being two options. Opinions? Thanks much. cc

James "Cubby" Culbertson wrote: > Ok, first off, I hate staining maple. Not because it's difficult but I > generally want maple to look, well like maple. But, I've made some floor > thresholds out of hard maple and now need to match them to the hardwood > floors. I was planning on using dyes to get to the color match. But in > my limited experience with staining, I see maple blotches pretty badly. > What do you all recommend to avoid this? I see wood conditioner and I can > always mix up some shellac as being two options. Opinions? > Thanks much.
Had do stain some maple almost out of desperation.
Used WoodCote gel stain.
Wipe on, wipe off.
It worked for me.
YMMV
Lew
>

Lew Hodgett wrote:
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Be verrrry careful, my friends ... it's a short, slippery, slope from staining maple to painting cherry. First thing you know, you'll be using pine to make furniture and blonding it. Then where will you be? Padded MDF headboards and plywood decks? Oh, the inhumanity of it all!
<grin> Bill

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Relax. I have no intention of painting cherry (or staining it for that matter!). Oh how that would kill me. I literally have not dye'd or stained anything in the past 4 years. The only reason for this is to match the floor. I wanted hardwood and to match the floor but couldn't find the same wood locally. I promise this is a once off! Cheers, cc

James "Cubby" Culbertson wrote:
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James ... just giving your leg a yank. That is something of a running joke on the wreck. Apparently it has something to do with an episode on NYW w/ Norm Abrams.
I haven't seen the episode because it is not on public broadcast TV in my area.
<soapbox="on">     I tolerate broadcast TV in my house, but absolutely will NOT pay     for a cable feed. It's a personal thing ... but I liken it to             having people in my living room whom I would not tolerate on my         porch doing things that I don't want done in my alley. <soapbox="off">
Bill

I was gona say fugetuboutit or maybe send you towards the minwax ployshades direction because getting Maple to take color well is really hard. But I think the Gel Stain route could be a winner. It is basically stain in a ploy gel so you can wipe it and leave it coating the surface and it will dry to a film finish, unlike and oil stain that would leave lots of residue if you left it on too thick.
I'd suggest get a shade that is towards the lighter end of what you want and let it build to the color you need. Then after completly dry, lots o' coats of poly.
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Correction:
It's WoodKote, not WoodCote.
They are located in Portland, OR.
Not a Home Depot item.
Been around along time.
Started using their stuff almost 40 years ago.
Lew

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Thanks Lew. I was hoping to dye it then topcoat but I think you're on to something here. I'll look them up. Cheers, cc

I use TT dyes, sprayed but not wiped for maple. No blotching. If you do not have a spray rig, you could apply a coat of dewaxed shellac first and then a tinted coat of shellac. Then you can top coat it with anything. Cheers, JG
http://www.homesteadfinishing.com/htdocs/TransTint.htm
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JGS wrote:
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That's the way to go to minimize blotching. But I usually put on 2 or 3 coats of clear shellac (with a pad) before I use a tinted coat.
-- It's turtles, all the way down

On Jul 30, 12:46 am, "James \"Cubby\" Culbertson"
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I had success staining maple using water-based stain. Wiped the piece down with water after sanding then knocked off the fuzz, wiped on the stain and it looked fine. Nothing fancy, I think it was Minwax from the Borg.

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My first reaction was 'if you can't make it match, make it contrast'.
So if you can't match the floor, and you will be doing very well if Lew's recommendation works, take another hard wood, and make something that contrasts well, not strikingly, and go from there. I did a transition piece in jatoba a couple of weeks back for a floor at my son's place, and it worked pretty well.
Good luck. Maple was not designed for stain.
Patriarch

Patriarch wrote:
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I had a similar situation trying to match a maple table I was making to some fairly light-finished maple cabinets. I used three different colors of Watco Danish oil (natural, golden oak, and walnut) and experimented until I got the proportions just right for a perfect match. I had no problem with splotching at all.