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Actually, to be specific, the nozzle on the spray can sucks. I tried to swap its ordinary round/cone spray nozzle with the one from the can of Deft lacquer, but no such luck, the one on the Deft can is some sort of seemingly proprietary design — the ‘adjustable fan spray’ thing is theirs alone, but I figured it would at least attach to other cans, nope.

If you’ve been following along you’ll know that I wasn’t 100% satisfied with the finish from the brush on enamel. It just wasn’t smooth enough. I can’t find black lacquer by any other company than Rustoleum, so I figured that it should work okay. AAGH! That nozzle is terrible!

I went about spraying it like I’d been spraying the lacquer, but I admit that I totally applied it wrong. I’m not accustomed to spray paint, and while I know how to do it, I don’t really have all that much experience using it. I put on way too heavy of a coat of this black lacquer, because I was going about spraying it like the other lacquer; that was a mistake.

After this little episode I had this afternoon, where I found myself with quite a little headache and rather too nauseated for my own good, I bought a real respirator, one with dual ‘volatile organics’ filters that screen out solvents. I strongly recommend, as in insist, that anyone spraying anything make that small financial sacrifice to protect their lungs and nervous system. I will never again spray anything containing solvents without wearing it. I did say that if I’d be using the lacquer anymore that I would buy one anyway. ;)

I need a second can of the black lacquer, it would figure, right? I also need to do a bit of “whoops repair” and get rid of the runs I put on the sides. They’re not terrible, but they’re not exactly pleasing to look at either. The Deft clear lacquer didn’t run at all, no matter how thickly I applied it. I’d say that this Rustoleum stuff is just overpriced black spraypaint, but it certainly isn’t given that I absolutely wreaked of solvent fumes.

At this point, hmmm… I’m not sure how it’s really looking. A second can of the black lacquer should complete it nicely, I think. Toward the end of the spraying process I finally starting getting the knack for it, and it appears to be suitably black all over, there are just a lot of heavy spots.

Using the glue to seal in the edges of the MDF was a disaster. When I went to wet sand the glue reactivated, lol. I had a horrible sticky mess… live and learn… again. Make this a lesson, anytime you expose bare MDF it must be primed again.

So, hmm… I don’t know if Walmart sells the Rustoleum Lacquer, I never bothered to look when I was getting other supplies. I’m not so sure I want to bother going out there just to ’see’ if they have it, only to find they don’t and then need to make that trip again tomorrow evening, but stopping at Lowe’s instead.

In other news, relating to furniture, I started on the blue desk yesterday. The paint remover is absolutely disgusting stuff. I think I’ll just use 60 grit sandpaper… it’s much less messy and it’ll actually be a faster process. I should restate, in starting on the blue desk, I’m only doing the drawers thus far. I’ll need to wait until I can get some help moving the actual desk and also be certain that the weather will be nice for several days, because I need to make room for the desk in the shed, heh. The drawers are coming along nicely though… completely sanded and with the first application of the Merlot stain. We decided to do her desk (as in, the woman, her desk being the blue one) in the Merlot, and I’ll do mine in the Ebony.

My goodness, what a difference stripping off that horrible blue paint has made! I think the refinishing of that desk will be quite a nice accomplishment, something I can be very proud of doing. It’s also a way of me doing something very nice for my mom, though it’s mutually beneficial — I benefit from having to work my ass off — I mean get more experience with the process, but she benefits by having a nice desk for once. :-)

Psst, the Nikon is horrible at photographing red.

The little temperature indicator broke 60° F, so I decided to give the Deft clear gloss wood finish, aka lacquer, a shot. The ideal temp low-end is 65, but it’s a lot warmer in the shed than it is out in the open air.

First off - I am absolutely going to buy a real respirator for future usage of lacquer - you know the kind with the little cartridges on the sides, like a gas mask. Lacquer is the most fowl substance I’ve ever worked with, you can practically feel it dissolving your brain the instant the trigger on the spray can is pressed down. I think I did fairly well, I held my breath as I was spraying, then took a big step back toward the small door of the shed to breathe. There was a fairly brisk wind this afternoon which helped a lot, a decent cross breeze was created by opening the single door, the double doors, and both windows. I didn’t develop a headache (apart from the one I’ve had all week), feel dizzy, become nauseated, or any of the other possible symptoms of exposure, so, like I said, I think I did fairly well. I was as careful as I could be without having a true respirator. My N95 mask is worthless for filtering out fumes, but I knew that anyway… it’s a “hazardous particulate” mask — what is used when sanding potentially dangerous stuff like MDF or paint, etc.

I put that N95 mask on anyway, I figured something would be better than nothing. WRONG. Even though I knew intellectually that the mask wouldn’t help in any manner, it still gave a false sense of security… I’m fairly sure I breathed in more of the vapors when I had the mask on… which was quite idiotic. I think I’m going to get a couple of those cheap “NO SMOKING” signs to put on the doors of the shed when I’m spraying — just in case someone would happen by, I don’t want the shed blowing up, especially with me holding the can of the explosive gas, lol.

The nozzle of the Deft lacquer is quite interesting. Instead of the usual cone shaped spray, which leaves a circle of product, it has a ‘vertical fan’ shape, which leaves a thin line of product. This unique spray pattern allows for very accurate application. I was impressed. ;)

It did take me a while to get a hang of both the distance between the wood and the speed I should move the can across the surface. I’ve found that application is best when fairly close and moving a lot slower than you think would be good to move. I suppose it’s because the lacquer is so incredibly thin and dries so incredibly fast… the fan shape spray pattern doesn’t create big blobs either; if it were a can of spray paint I’d have huge puddles of the junk everywhere.

The surface isn’t “mirror smooth” by any stretch, but I really like how it turned out. It looks like real wood, you can see some of the texture of the grain. I didn’t really sand it down after the first “light” application. You don’t have to sand between sprays of lacquer, but you can to remove any “nubs” …I did a light pass with 4/0 steel wool, and after the second application did a super light sanding with 400 grit paper. I sanded by machine to 180, then to 220 by hand (with garnet paper) — I’m thinking though (for the future) that I could probably either do a heavier sanding at 220 - perhaps on the finishing sander, or go up to 320 by hand. There’s also the possibility of using the special lacquer sanding sealer, but I’ve never used a sanding sealer before and it’s generally regarded as the ‘weak point’ in a finish. It’s just a watered down version of the real thing anyway… I think.

I guess the brilliant thing is that it’s pretty difficult to mess the finish up now… lacquer will melt into itself, self-level, etc, so I think I’m pretty good to go. The can recommends 4 spray sessions, a light coat and then a ‘repeat three times’ sort of direction. I’m at a light coat and two additional, so going one more certainly isn’t out of the question. I really love how it looks now, and after about a week I can do some rubbing & buffing. I think that’s the route I’ll take, I can always apply more lacquer whenever I’d like.

So far the lacquer is winning the battle of finishes. I really liked the wax by itself, really like the tung oil with wax on it… and as I’ve written before my desk was finished with tung oil; lacquer though, wow! Deft does make their lacquer in quarts — supposedly one can brush it on (I don’t quite feel the desire to buy an HVLP gun and a compressor, even if it would have a whole multitude of application usages), buying it in quarts would make the idea of lacquering my desk much more financially viable — given that I used about half the $5 can just for that 8×24″ tealight tray. Lacquering my whole desk out of the spray can does seem like a very financially ruinsome affair. ;) In any case, if spraying would be the only route to go, buying enough of the spray cans would still certainly cost less than setting up ‘proper’ spray equipment.

This is the nicest thing I’ve ever made out of wood. I’m very tempted to start lacquering everything. ;) …Unfortunately you can’t apply it to poly, which is also fortunate, because I’m not tempted to detach my stemware rack from the ceiling so that I can lacquer it. I look forward to furthur exploring this fun mr. woodworker insanity.

I hemmed over buying a can of Deft Gloss Lacquer the other night at Lowe’s, but then went back the next day for some other things and decided to pick it up anyway.

In a few hours my tealight holder will be ready for final finishing, that is, the clear protective coating over the stain. The temperature is still pretty cold outside, at 48° F which makes using the spray lacquer less than ideal. I’d be applying it in the shed, which is again less than ideal from a health & possible explosion aspect (haha), but it’s a hell of a lot better than doing it inside of the house. ;)

The tung oil can be applied indoors, but has a lengthy recoat time, unlike the lacquer. I think I’ll give the lacquer a try though. I did sand this quite finely, so hopefully I’ll be able to test just how ‘mirror finish’ I can get it without going to outrageous measures.

Anyway, here’s the piece, stained Merlot on top, Deep Ebony on the bottom. I’ve yet to attach the two pieces together, I think I’ll be just using yellow pva glue, of course I stained all surfaces so glue might not be such a great idea afterall. This image can be enlarged by clicking on it.

It really is amazing how I explode into tangent projects whenever I start something.

I can ‘blame’ all of this on Matt, this time. I wanted a nicer bedroom, so I started doing the Stolmen system. That lead me eventually to wanting something to put little things in, which lead me to buying that unfinished box and staining it. Upon seeing how nice that little box was it made me want to start refinishing the desks, which lead to wanting to fix my coffee table. The coffee table lead me to want something ‘cool’ to go on top of it, which has me now working on this neat tealight holder thing.

I took a piece of 1″x8″x2′ poplar, drilled six aligned 2.125″ holes in it down the center, then placed that on top of a piece of MDF of similar dimensions, just more narrow and shorter. This creates a sort of pedestal and a bottom surface for the holes. I’ll be staining the poplar this “Merlot” colour from the Olympic line of stains (and btw, it’s assinine to buy the half pints of stain, the full quarts cost a mere $2 more). The big difference, apart from having a spectacular piece of wood as the top surface, is that the holes are large enough to hold the glass tealight holders from Ikea, leaving approximately .375″ of the tealight holder exposed, it looks awesome. ;)

I like it so much that I’m having second thoughts of using the MDF as the bottom piece. No one will see it unless they pick the whole thing up anyway, but, errm… I don’t know, it’d only be a couple more dollars for an appropriately sized piece of Poplar. Since I’ve not glued the pieces together yet, there’s still plenty of time to decide.

While doing all the research on the various paints, stains, clear finishes, etc, I renewed my interest in Chess. I haven’t played the game in an extremely long time, I’m fairly certain my last game of Chess was with Dave probably, my god, that first time he was here. One major problem is that I really lack a decent set of game pieces, I don’t even think that the crappy and hollow plastic set is even complete anymore. I do have this egregiously expensive Cival War set from my dad, and a crystal and a glass set, but… ehhh. Nothing says ‘yay’ quite like wood, right?

So, dear god, the possibilities are so endless when it comes to wood Chess pieces. Granted, most of them are based on the venerable Staunten pattern, but it appears there are multiple modernized versions available too (for a hefty price of course). I think I’ve mostly settled on this particular set, it can be found ranging between $50 and $100, thankfully I found a fairly reputable place where the lower price of that is available.

This brings another problem. I don’t have any chess boards with squares big enough to actually use those pieces on, hah. My dad veneered two chess boards a very long time ago. I think there’s a better one than the one I found lying around here somewhere, but I can’t find it. The one I’ve had in my pocession has a less than perfect veneering job, a lot of the squares are a bit wonky. The other problem, like I mentioned, is that the squares are much, much too small. I need a board with 2″ squares, these are more like 1.5″ …too small, again.

I have no idea how difficult it would be to veneer all 64 little squares to a substrate. I’m willing to try it, but if I screw up it’s rather an expensive screwup all things considered. I can’t find any source of the veneers I want in this country — unless I want to buy enough to cover an entire kitchen’s worth of cabinets and spend a huge fortune. I finally found this place in the UK that will sell veneer by the square foot, because afterall, I only need (less than) two square feet — one of each type of wood. Unfortunately there is a minimum order of $19 and the UK VAT of nearly 20%, not counting international shipping charges, blegh.

I’m still interested in giving it a go, though the idea of cutting 64 2″ squares where each one is absolutely perfectly sized indentical to all the others is a bit… daunting. I guess being required to spend $20 means that I’d be ‘required’ to get enough to do multiple boards, so if I’d screw up I have lots and lots of veneer left to practice with.

I’d love to make the chess pieces too, but I’d need to get a lathe, and a duplicating lathe at that, and I’d of course need to learn how to actually do it along with sourcing the actual blocks of wood — and pine just wouldn’t cut it, no pun intended.

As for the chessboard though, I learned about a technique of doing faux marquetry, where one takes an x-acto knife and scores out the sections, in theory this prevents the stain from bleeding into the other areas. I picked up a piece of 2′x2′ fine birch plywood for $5 and I’m willing to give that a shot. I need to pick the other colour, the light colour, for the squares… The ebony and merlot stains together look quite nice, but that’d make it look a bit too much like a super glorified checkerboard. I have no hopes of matching the colour of the chess pieces, so I’m going to go for a coordinated colour scheme instead. If it turns out badly with the stain, I can always paint it, heh, or even perhaps veneer over it, if I’m very careful. With the plywood chunk being only $5 though, it isn’t a huge loss if I mess up.

Given that the chessboards I like cost in the range of $100 and more, making an attempt at creating one seems a worthwhile pursuit.

I’m not going to do a lot of plant material purchasing this year, since I’d spent so much last year outside. I do though want to make a set of nice Adirondack chairs, notice I said make… decent ones cost an outrageous $160+ and that just isn’t acceptable, considering making one is apparently quite easy and the materials are not at all expensive. This will certainly be an example of my famous false economy, because I will undoubtedly feel the need to buy myself a table saw. ;)

I am very happy to report that all of my roses survived the winter and are starting to bud out (leaf-wise). It appears that everything in the herb & perennial gardens has also survived the winter — my totally unproductive strawberry plants also are nice and green now. Contrary to common belief, the winter is worse on plants when there is not a lot of snow, the cold and bitter wind we experienced is much harder on the plants than being insulated in the white stuff.

Unless I find myself faced with a great sale, I’ll probably be just buying the usual productive annuals — tomato and pepper plants. This isn’t to say I won’t be spending a lot of time outside, because I certainly will, just mostly doing maintenance and upkeep type activities. With it soon going to be just me and the woman here, it’ll be a lot easier to keep the outside nice, I won’t have my lazy & greedy brother David mucking up everything by throwing junk around.

I’ve also given a lot of thought to the idea of building my dining table. I mentioned it briefly in the last entry (I think), but it actually seems like something that would work. With proper reinforcement of the MDF top, I think it’s doable. Apart from the time, even if it doesn’t turn out all that great (if I actually do it), the materials will cost a tiny faction of the cost of buying one. Granted, the purchased one would be veneered, but… glossy black lacquer is just as nice, right? I’m just not so sure my mother would appreciate a glossy black lacquer table. ;)

The project ideas just don’t stop do they? Yeah, I know… this is what I do when I’m either extremely bored and/or broken-hearted, more of the latter this time, really. I need to find some sort of productive and hopefully educational outlet for all of my… agony, and building stuff is the best way I know.

I want to also build a frame for my bed. Actually, to avoid building a true bedframe, I want to just sort of build a headboard/footboard with side rails. It would be similar, though better (hah) than the Ikea Lillehammer Bed. The ‘rails’ will be 10″ high, wide, depending on how you look at it, enough to fully cover the box spring and a tiny portion of the mattress. It’d be basically a big box that bolts onto the front and back of the bed. I need to get this little hardware kit to give my metal bedframe the footboard extension, but that’s a minor thing. I would either make it out of MDF and paint it gloss white (most likely) or perhaps out of cheapish pine (clear, NOT knotty!) planks, maybe even Poplar, but that would get expensive. It’s a sin to paint wood, so of course I’d stain if I went that route. I think it’d be a nice little touch, would cost at most $40, and would allow me to do away with a ‘bed skirt’ ..and even though mine is tailored versus being the ruffled kind, I still don’t like it all that much.

Okay, that’s it for now. :)

I was able to get a second (third, technically, but my Mom doesn’t count) lastnight on the coffee table. I’m leaning toward calling it “good enough” at this point, even though I know I could probably do better with another wet sanding and some spray paint/lacquer.

That was taken lastnight, you can see it’s still somewhat ‘bumpy’ in appearance on the top.

This morning that bumpiness mostly vanished. Unfortunately a tiny hair seems to have fallen onto the top, leaving a little and very obvious defect. I’m considering taking some 4/0 steel wool and attempting to ‘polish out’ the top, but I’ll only attempt that if the weather is cooperative.

I’m pretty much stuck at this moment though, it’ll be raining or otherwise too cold for the next few days to be able to do anything with it outside.

So for now, it’ll have to be good enough. I’ll live with it for a few days, if the defects still bother me, I’ll then give it a go with the spray enamel — I’ll probably use the same paint, just in spray form, at least that’s one thing going for me, Rustoleum has the paint in gallons, quarts, and aerosols.