When applying finish to a tabletop recently, I discovered a couple of areas of severe tearout I had missed. To remove it with a card scraper or sandpaper would have left an obvious valley in the finished top, so I came up with a simple alternative. I filled the small voids with epoxy (I use QuickCure 5 Epoxy from LeeValley.com) and then leveled the areas with a sharp chisel and a card scraper. A bit of light sanding and a new coat of finish makes the tearout disappear. My method has worked under simple oil finishes as well as oil-varnish blends.
—CHARLES MAK, Calgar y, Alta., Canada
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Comments
I recently used this technique to repair grain separation and tearout on some pine doors. I used a disposable flux brush to "paint" epoxy into the area, clamped on a block coated with clear packing tape to force the grain to lay flat, then sanded the area to remove the excess epoxy. The flaws practically disappeared!
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