What is the best brand wood stain to use on solid oak kitchen cabinets?The most furniture quality finish?
Question:I am putting new doors on solid oak frame kitchen cabinets.The new doors are unfinished solid oak.The frames and sides are about 10 years old, and have been stained once.The current color is a miniwax provincial.I am sanding the frame and preparing it for the new doors.The miniwax cherry stain I have tried so far doesn't give me the color and depth I am looking for.What is the best brand of stain to give a rich furniture grade color and smoothness on the cabinets and where can I buy it?Cost really doesn't matter.I just want a great rich looking finish in a medium cherry tone when finished.
Answers:
I would not even put MinWax on the bottom of my garbage can. There is a specific reason. The stain has a sealer in it which means that what you see the first time around is about all you are going to see. Contact Mohawk Finishes and see what products that they have.
http://www.mohawk-finishing.com/...
I also would not use a varnish to finish it with. Varnish spots with water, like leaving a sweating glass on a table, but lacquer is more immune.
If it were mine, and I have done this, I would finish the cabinets while they are down and instead of attempting to put on varnish with a brush, rent a compressor and a spray gun and learn how to use the spray gun. That way you don't get brush marks, or bristles from the brush, on the cabinets.
Lacquer is thinner than varnish and therefore needs more coats. If you don't have a controlled environment, you might have to use a lacquer retardant to make it dry slower. That will assist in doing away with "blushing." I normally put on 8-10 thin coats and rub it down with steel wool, polishing it with a compound that Mohawk has.
I finish furniture all the time. Lacquer is forgiving, varnish is not. Lacquer is quick drying, perhaps 10-15 minutes per coat, varnish takes hours.
I disagree with the respondent who said that red oak does not take stain easily. I have used many gallons, generally on red oak, and get the results I want. Find the Mohawk dealer in your area and get what help they can provide.
Stain gives you color, not finish. Min Wax is actually one of the best stains on the market. The problem is that oak ( especially red oak ) has such a tight grain pattern that it does not take stain well. Your best bet is to use a piece of scrap oak with a grain pattern close to your cabinets, make sure it is sanded smooth ( to at least 220 grit) and try different things. Try multiple coats of stain or you may want to try a wood dye. There are liquid dyes and powdered dyes that you mix yourself. You can also try mixing stains to get a custom color.
As for the finish use a good clear eurothane varnish in whatever finish you're looking for. Satin, Semi-Gloss, Gloss Etc. Sand inbetween coats with 400Grit sand paper or 00 steel wool and brush in one direction only when applying. With the grain, but only one direction. If there's a chance of it getting wet, you may want to consider exterior varnish. After the final coat, you may lightly sand with very smooth sandpaper or steel wool. If that dulls the finish too much you can wax it with paste wax or apply another thin coat and let it go.
Minwax makes a mahogany stain which is darker than the cherry. Remember that oak is harder than pine and most color charts show stain on pine. Thus, most of the time you need to give 2 or 3 coats of stain on oak to reach the desired finish. You might concider another coat of the cherry before changing color.
Sometimes wood needs more than one coat to obtain the color you want. I love the Minwax brand and use it all the time. I especially like the Polyshades type which eliminates a topcoat of poly. If you can get a piece of scrapwood, try multiple coats of your stain and use fine steel wool between coats. Good luck.
It takes more than stain to give a furniture quality finish. The wood must be sanded and clean, the stain needs to be applied correctly and a proper finish coating needs to be applied. Depending on the finish, it can take multiple coats of lacquer with sandings between.
May cabinet companies now use conversion varnishes which require the use of a catalyst, like you would an epoxy. It provides an extremely durable, long lasting finish
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