Furniture, Wood and Cabinetry Finishing - need pre stain advise

hello, i have a 12' opening between my living room and dining room which had one 3 foot cabinet at each side with a 6' space in between. i built the cabinets and the opening trim out of premium pine. my question is when i stain and poly the wood i believe i need to either condition it or sand seal the pine before i stain it. i have asked quite a few people and i can't come up with an agreeing answer. the conditioner says it has to have the stain applied to the wood withing 2 hours of conditioning and that is going to be a project with all the trimwork around the opening and the cabinets. i plan on using an oil-based min-wax stain and a
gloss poly. what do you suggest- wood conditioner or sand sealer- prior to staining.
Roland from Conn.

I have used conditioner on pine sometimes and sometimes not. I cannot tell any difference. I found that it was impossible to finish with any piece of any size within the 2 hours time period.

Pine tends to stain irregularly anyway. I would not sand pine more than 120 / 150 grit before staining to avoid polishing it.

With sanding sealer you can apply it and sand it off to the wood and resolve some of the irregularity by filling the fine grain in swirls and depressions in knots prior to staining.

Staining pine is a challenge.

Chris, I appreciate your prompt reply to my post. your advise convinced me to use sand sealer instead of conditioner.
tks
roland from Conn.

You should play with some scrap pieces to determine what works best for you. I recently stained some pine door casing with an oil based Maple stain. Since pine can do strange things when you're staining it, I tacked it off with paint thinner after sanding then stained it. It came out perfect - no blotches. :D

hello again, we were just talking today about running some test on scrap pieces. i am curious about how all the trim is going to come out too. i have wall panels built on the living room side of the cabinets, fancy base moldings, trim to frame for the cabinet doors, trim on the underside of the cabinet top and three different built up trims for the archway. this is probably going to be a nighmare for dripping off the moldings. i have the wall panels built onto pine wainscoating.
Did you just wipe the trim with paint thinner before staining without any pre-sealer. we are going for a medium early american oil-based stain.
roland in Conn.

I just moisten a rag or paper towel with paint thinner and wipe my wood down with it. The idea is to tack it off (remove sawdust). The slight amount of residual oil left behind from the paint thinner acts as a sealer to help keep the stain even.

tks for the info. i will let you know how my project came out.
roland from Conn.