Hi,
I need some advice on finishing (refinishing?) a monkeypod slab table. I fell in love with a picture of a large slab of monkeypod wood, and ended up having it made into a table and shipped to me from Indonesia. This turned out to not be such a smart decision. Getting it to my home turned out to be far more expensive and difficult than I could have imagined, and the table has a small crack, a banged up corner, etc. But it’s a beautiful piece of wood and it weighs 600 pounds, so it’s now a permanent part of the living room. I need to sand it and finish it, but it arrived with some kind of finish/oil haphazardly put on. I asked the people who shipped it to me what the finish was and they just replied “Furniture oil.” It’s slightly shiny. So now I’m not really sure what my options are. I’m a single working mom, so I’m not up for one of the lengthy and complicated finishing techniques I often see described here. I need something durable for little kid messes. My dad said to use polyurethane and my grandfather said to use Deft, but the forums here seem to say that Polyurethane is too plasticy and prone to cracks, and Deft is potentially yellowing. Plus I don’t want to have to “pullover” (what the heck is that?). I can’t spray anything because this is in my living room.
I’m hoping for a relatively simple to apply, durable, beautiful finish, that I can apply over the mystery finish I have now (or what’s left of it after I’m done sanding). Am I asking for the impossible? I’m attaching a picture of it in case that’s useful.
Thanks for your help!!
Melissa
Replies
About the crack
If it looks like it will turn into a problem, or if you want to prevent a problem, you may want to get a woodworker that has good references to put in one or more butterflies to stabilize the split
http://www.woodworkersinstitute.com/page.asp?p=624
Click on photo number 9 to see some butterfly keys installed in a table.
Welllll . . .
These here oily tropical woods are kind of difficult to finish without problems. I know what you said about fumes but . . .
I would open up the house for lots of ventilation
Scrub the thing down with paint thinner (NOT PAINT STRIPPER) to get off any weird oily finish stuff that may stay tacky and not dry
Then . . . are you ready . . .
Just wax it with bee's wax or some microcrystalline wax (can get pricy for microcrystalline wax.)
When the table looks like it needs it wash it with dish soap and water and re wax it.
If the kids do some major customization to the table that you find you can do without then sand or plane it off and rewax.
I get this from this book by a world renowned woodworker talking about similar oily tropical wood. He never mentions monkey pod but anyway I am sure this would be his solution. Here is the book if you would like to look through it. Is often on hand in libraries :
The Fine Art Of Cabinetmaking by James Krenov page 52 and 53 for instance
http://www.amazon.com/Fine-Art-Cabinetmaking-James-Krenov/dp/1933502096/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1315704784&sr=1-1
You can make your own bee's wax polish ( just paint thinner and wax shavings in a jar ) but here is a source :
http://beepolish.com/
And for the microcrystalline (a little goes a long way but your table is large) here is a source:
http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/renaissancewax.aspx
Monkey Wood Info
Here is a some info on monkey wood: http://www.wood-database.com/lumber-identification/hardwoods/monkeypod/
Here is some more: http://www.hearnehardwoods.com/hardwoods/exotic_hardwoods/exotic_wood/monkey_pod_lumber/monkey_pod.html
It makes a person wonder
Things move so slow in this chat room it makes a person wonder if the person posting the question gets abducted by aliens soon after they post the question. I hope they bring Melissa back soon, I would like to hear back.
Just wondering
So . . . Melissa . . . what did you wind up doing with your table ?
I'm curious how you ended up finishing your slab of monkeypod (a gorgeous piece, I must add!)? I'm considering buying a slab of the same, and have been researching methods for finishing it. Hope it worked out well for you in the end.
Happy New Year!
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