I like a product made by MINWAX called TUNG OIL FINISH. I’m thinking this is what could otherwise be called danish oil made using tung oil, mineral spirits and some type of varnish. Why do finish manufacturers have to be so secretive and call a spade a spade?
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You are not wrong. There is 100% pure tung oil and tung oil with junk in it that travels under a bunch of different names. It is confusing to say the least.
I'm of the opinion all the secrecy or proprietary formulas are to convince users they have to use their thinners, cleaners, additives and applicators,etc. Or void any warranty, scare one into believing their project will fail. Marketing 101.
Are all products equal? I dare say no, absolutely not.
It's all the same thing, Danish oil, X-oil finish. Most of these products use BLO and very little (if any) of the Tung or Teak or what ever oil they proclaim to be.
One of my favorite finishes is equal parts of tung oil, mineral spirits, and varnish (I might add a bit of japan drier). I think the "Tung Oil Finish" is close to the same.
The 1:1:1 mix that is so popular is noting like the "finish" products that are sold.
The off the shelf products have mostly solvent, 60-70 % and only about 10% +/- oil in them, which is enough. Too much oil in the mix won't hurt anything but most of it simply ends up on the wiping rag. The entire point is to thin the mixture enough so that it penetrates as deep as possible, 33% can still be a thick mixture and may not perform as well as one would like, as well as wasting oil for no reason.
The manufacturers stop being secretive when required to issue a material safety data sheet of their product. Some are more secretive than others when writing the data sheet since only the hazardous material needs to be indicated. In this case, Minwax only specified solvent content, 65%, which leaves very little to oil and varnish, and varnish also containing hazardous substances tells me that this is is a blend of mineral spirit and oil, tung or linseed.
The way I have always thought of it is that if it says " finish" its a finish. So tung oil is hopefully tung oil and tung oil finish is mixed with various polymers and dryers and solvents ,pigments etc. The formula is proprietary, therefore "secret". If they told you what is in it and in what proportions that would be equivalent to a recipe. They don't want you to make your own!
But, some things called tung oil actually contain zero tung oil. Some things called oils have zero oil in them. Teak oil? There's no such thing.
Those things are wrong and misleading, and shouldn't be allowed, period.
Teak oil was developed for marine use. Teak is common material for the brightwork on boats, thus "teak oil". If we want to get into semantics we can talk about what to call car wax next.
Makers will always keep the recipies under wraps. As long as I can feed and nourish my wood I'll be happy.
Oh, no you didn't.
"Feed and nourish" a non-living object like wood...would that same principle apply to aluminum? (Just kidding, I know you are being facetious).
Homer Formby was the P. T. Barnum of wood finishing - I believe he even had his own TV show to market his line of products. (He's 98 years old now and retired in Florida - maybe his elixir to "feed and nourish" works for humans as well).
A case in point ; Tried & True Danish oil recipe, Linseed oil : https://s3.gomedia.ws/wp-content/uploads/sites/11/2016/03/FBC-TRIED-AND-TRUE-DO_MTR_GHSF_EN.pdf
Nothing personal, but John's wrong. Teak oil is designed for oily woods like teak. Hence the name. And, if the label says "Tung oil" then it's just tung oil. Kinda like being well vs being in a state of wellness, if the word 'finish' is added it's a knockoff.
Nope. Minwax Tung Oil has no tung oil in it. There are others.
The word "finish" on a can of wood finish means nothing. Manufacturers started putting that on the label so people would know it wasn't for cooking or eating.
I checked about 5 ingredient lists for so called teak oil and the main ingredient remains mineral spirits and other petroleum distillate called stoddard solvents, up to 75% in some cases such as the marine types, the active component is linseed oil when stated . That’s asking a lot of $$ for a 4;1 mix of mineral spirit and linseed oil.
It IS pricey, but that's par for the course when you buy a B.O.A.T.. I will forever be crew, and not Captain.
Wish I was crew also but unfortunately, I am captain and as we are on the hard preparing for the launch next week we all agreed in the yard that we have stopped counting $$ weeks ago as maintenance started.
Minwax can says " tung oil finish" sort of back to where we started. You would hope that when it refers to a specific oil that it would have at least some of that oil in it.. But then there isn't likely to be Danes in Danish Oil finish.. well maybe back in Viking days but not anymore.. Most ,at least the ones I've tried, of the (so called)oil finishes have some level of varnish and driers in them and harden to some degree as opposed to a true oil. I would think that teak oil would not contain BLO as it tends to go dark or even black if subjected to uv.
In my youth I went to work in a boat yard for a bit thinking that that's where the fine woodworking was to be found. It was there but those old guys were going to get all of it. I was going to get scraping and caulking and refastening and wading through diesel slim maybe for years and at a really low rate of pay. What I did get out of it was a crew spot on a 60ft. ketch sailing the South Pacific! What I learned was that boats ,the ones that go far out to sea, are very very expensive! Buying the boat was the cheap part!
Later a guy near me wanted to build a boat so he hired me and we built a 40' x 60' shop on his sort of farm and a 32' cutter. The building became my shop for many years ,it was in theory a shared shop but he was never there. He didn't need to actually work so he didn't. He did in fact know how to sail though. Ultimately he decided to trade his wife in for a newer model and that blew up the whole deal.
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