I put a coat of general finishes water based dye stain on African mahogany last night and noticed light speckles in the finish that correspond to the pores of the grain.
I sanded with a ROS starting with 120 and then moved to 180. After this, I spritzed water on the surface and knocked down the grain with 320 until it was no longer raising. Once dry, I wiped on a liberal coat of dye stain and then wiped the excess after a few minutes. Is this a normal thing for this wood or did I do something incorrectly? The dye looks consistent aside from the speckled appearance.
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I don't have much experience with mahogany but, I would say that is a normal look. The "specks" are probably caused by natural oil in the wood concentrated in the pores. You might get better results with an oil based stain or a dye like Transtint mixed in alcohol. If you have some scrap, I would do some experimenting.
I use a lot of Sapele and dearly love the color of the natural wood and the way it darkens over time. Not sure why one would want to dye or stain Sapele.
I normally like the natural colors of hardwoods but I've been experimenting with the Greene and Greene style that Darrell Peart is doing. Dyes can mimic the finishing technique once used years ago, just not as toxic (potassium dichromate).
Bonus - looks fantastic to me.
That's a great feature if you can reproduce it!
Can't help with why it happened, but second the test piece before finishing...
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