Together Forever and Never to Part
Dec
29
2010
I recently finished a project and tried a new (to me) product: combination stain and polyurethane in a single can.
It worked as advertised, but I’m not a fan. This happened to be PolyShades by Minwax, but I’m guessing that I wouldn’t like any stain-and-poly-together-in-one product by anybody.
The problem is that the simplicity takes away your ability to manage the shade of the stain.
In other words, you can’t keep sanding and applying poly to get a smoother, deeper finish, because each application results in more (i.e. darker) stain.
Here is what it looked like with zero, one, and two coats:
It turned out okay, but there were some spots that were rougher than I wanted, but I didn’t want to add more stain. And there were some spots where the stain had pooled and made the finish obviously darker than the surrounding areas, but I didn’t want to wipe off the poly.
I suppose it’s a fine product if you don’t care much about the finish. I didn’t think I would care as much as I did, but not having the ability to adjust little things frustrated me.
Go with separate stain and clear coat.
or a bag for your journey, or even two coats, or sandals, or a staff; for the worker is worthy of his support.
Matthew 10:10
This little article thingy was written by Some Guy sometime around 12:31 am and has been carefully placed in the Projects category.
December 29th, 2010 at 8:56 pm
Sounds great for when I sand and stain our picnic table!