Furniture, Wood and Cabinetry Finishing - How to refinish Thomasville dining room table? Help, please.

Very nice Thomasville table has water damage to the top surface. Water leaked from above, over the holiday, and it was trapped on the surface by the table cloth.

Obvious damage to the finish over 80% of the top surface. Finish is very hard, my guess is some kind of polyurethane. It clogs my sander, although I am using 220 grit paper.

Should I use more aggressive paper and remove all of the finish, or should I be using some kind of stripper followed by finish sanding?

Thanks, in advance, for your help.

Mark

Use stripper, followed by washing it down with lacquer thinner to neutralize the acids in the stripper.

If you've applied furniture polish/wax to the table, I highly recommend that you "Slowly" build the finish. Several light coats are better than 3 heavy coats.

You can thin your first coat with mineral spirts. You want your first coat to be a skim coat. Basically, you just want to seal the wood first.

The reason for building it slow with the caution that youve used polishes and waxes is that you could end up with "Fish Eye" which is a contamination from using those wonderful "well marketed" products. You should NEVER need to use anything but a very damp cloth, followed by a dry one.

Keep in mind, the minute you start to use polishes, etc you need to keep up with it, or it will ruin the look of the finish. Using a lemon oil MAYBE 1 or 2 times a year will be OK. If needed.

Sawdust guy,

Excuse me, but I have never done this before. What type of stripper should I buy to attempt this? Will I have to restain the wood after stripping?

Looking for all the help I can get.

Thanks.

You can buy a stripper from Home Depot, but DON'T get one that smells all nice and pretty. Reason being, is to make it smell nice and pretty, they take away a lot of the chemical that does that actual stripping.

Before you decide to strip the piece, you need to find out whether it's all real wood. Doesn't have to be solid wood, as the top is probably a wood veneer. If you put stripper on areas that aren't real wood, you will wipe off all of the photo finish or fake graning that was done.

First, buy some cheap throw away brushes, 100,150, 220, and 320 grit sand paper, lacquer thinner, steel wool "o" corse, a metal putty knife, an empty small bucket for the lacquer thinner and the stripper, a power sander, the finish of choice "Some type of polyurathane", a very good brush either ox or horses hair 3", t-shirt rags, and tack cloths.

Expect to spend no less than $150.00 on this project.

Apply the stripper with one of the cheap throw away brushes. Allow it to sit for at least 10-15 mins. You will notice that the finish will bubble up. Make sure you do this in a well ventilated area with no pilot lights around. No sources of heat, and that includes space heaters. All of these are sources of possible fire hazards.

Once the finish has bubbled up all over, take the putty knife and scrape off the stripper. Apply more stripper to areas that the finish didn't totally come up. There will be areas that will be hard to get off with only the stripper and in those ares you'll need to sand it off. Once you get as much off as you can with the stripper, take lacquer thinner on a tshirt type rag and wipe it all down with lacquer thinner. You'll end up using several rags. DO NOT THROW THEM INTO YOUR WASTE CAN INSIDE YOUR HOME. Let them dry out before you throw them away.

Allow it all to dry for at least 24 hours before you attempt to sand anything. Once dry, you can start the sanding process. ALWAYS SAND WITH THE GRAIN, NEVER GO CROSS GRAIN. For spindles, etc you can sand "Around" the turned piece. Sand using 100 grit first. BE VERY CAREFUL IF YOU'RE SANDING VENEERED PARTS, AS THE VENEER IS ONLY SO THICK. IF YOU SAND TOO FAR, YOU CAN'T GO BACK. Once it's all sanded with 100, go to 150 and then 220. Use a blow gun inbetween sanding stages. Don't expect to get all of the stain out of the graining.

Once it's all sanded to your liking and it's nice and smooth, blow it all off and start with your first coat of finish or stain it first. If you stain it, allow it to dry for at least 8 hours before you apply a finish. Your first coat should be a very light coat, as you just want to seal the graining. This is where you're going to use the ox or horses hair brush which can be purchased at a paint store. You wont find it at home depot. Remember to stir the finish, allow to sit for about 10 mins to let the bubbles settle down before you start to brush on the new finish. Remember to always brush in one direction only. By brushing back and forth creates bubbles. You'll end up with some bubbles, but by cutting out the finish with 320 or 400 grit sand paper inbetween coats will help keep it from happening.

Allow the first coat to dry 24 hours before you apply your second coat. The second coat, make sure you get full coverage. Allow to dry for 24 hours and recoat your last coat. Do not apply more than 3 full coats after your "seal coat" or you'll end up with problems with the finish. After sanding by hand inbetween coats, make sure you blow it off before you apply your next coat of finish.

If you have any further questions, please let me know.

I guess I will give it a whirl. If I screw it up, I guess I can always hire a guy like you to fix it for me.

Mark

:)

Well, trial and error is the only way anyone can learn how to do things, especially in this business. I've been a custom cabinetmaker for 16 years and I'm constantly learning. Sometimes I mess up and have to re-do things. That's how we learn better and faster ways to do things. :)

Take a before picture and an after, then post it for us to see. Thanks!


P.s. I forgot to add, wear safety glasses and chemical resistant gloves. Both can be purchased at home depot too.