I’ve been working with ¾” cherry veneer plywood to make a box-like stand. The veneer strips are book matched creating a beautiful figure. The problem is the difference in brightness between adjacent strips of veneer after the finish – an oil, varnish rub on mixture – has been applied. The contrast depends upon the viewing angle, but in any case the seams are accentuated and end up detracting from the overall appearance of the piece. Sometimes this occurs over the entire length of a side, at other times only partially across a side of the box and that especially looks bad. I’ve tried working around the seams and looked for plywood with wider strips, but so far have had no success.
Do you have any finishing or other suggestions to help avoid or minimize this effect?
Replies
The light/dark variations in surface luster occur with virtually all veneer and even within the surface of some solid lumber (i.e.--quartersawn mahogany) because of the way light is reflected off of the grain of the wood. The contrasting effect is especially evident with bookmatched veneer and glossy finishes. There are three finishing techniques you can use to minimize the effect:
1) Apply a highly pigmented stain. The "mud" of the pigment refracts more of the light bouncing off the surface. Given that you've already applied an oil-varnish finish, this technique is not available to you unless you want to strip the piece and start over.
2) Topcoat the surface with a satin or even a flat finish. Flattening agents in the finish (similar to powdered talc) break up the reflectivity of the surface.
3) Apply a coat of paste wax over your existing finish using 0000 steel wool as the applicator. The steel wool will help to dull the sheen of your varnished surface.
For more on the subject of luster, see the article by Thomas Schrunk in the "Closer Look" column of FWW issue #182, pp. 26-30.
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