O/T Interior Wood Finish Preservative

I know this is way off topic of tractors but our farm house has all real wood interior doors and trim all stained. I wanted to ask what is the best wood preservative such as wood oil or polyurethane or any other product?? These were two that I could think of

Thanks for any information...

I love the new urethane varnish made by minwax. It goes on easily and gets very hard. lasts a long time.

I like an oil finish myself, but it may not penetrate well if there is already polyurethane on the wood. I would say that much depends on how high of a finish you want, as poly will make it quite shiny in one or two coats. I would also advise against applying any of these finishes at this time of year unless you have somewhere else to live for a day or two while it dries, as the fumes are rather bad for you.
Zach

Wipe on satin polyurethane. You will really like it.

I prefer polyurethane.......I sometimes use gloss and sometimes satin...depends on your final look desired.......I mix it 50/50 with mineral spirits...wipe it on with a rag....fine steel wool after it dries for 24 hours..and wipe on another coat. I usually will apply 3 coats.....and on the final coat, I will rub it very lightly with very fine steel wool.

I've been woodworking 26 years and I won't use anything made by Minwax; there are much better brand names on the market.

The oil based poly that I like the best is made by Bulls Eye.

Water base poly is good too; no odor so safe to use inside. It is a clear coat that does not add any yellow to the finish like some of the oil base polys.

Several years back we did a downstairs make over . My OLD house was built in 1892 and has all red oak trim . We tore out all the old horse hair plaster that was falling down and put up all new drywall . I was vary careful on removing the old trim and it was most difficult to do since the OLD carpenter wanted it to last till the end of time used finish nails the likes i had never seen before , they were almost five inches long . The old varnish was all cracking and proved to be a challenge to remove as i learned real fast that you could not sand it off you could not use a heat gun and scraper as it made a bigger mess , but if you just bought a good carbide hand scraper it would come off then you could sand and restain. I used the water based poly after the stain dried and i CHEATED i bought a cheap China made spray gun and sprayed all the trim . I put down three heavy coates and let dry for a day and with 320 paper go over it lightly and thenlay down two more coates . I did damage some of the trim and had to reproduce it and this was where the fun came in since you can not go to the big box stores and buy what you need or go to a small lumber yard and find it i had to go to a saw mill and get rough sawed and make it . 8 inch base boards 7/8 thick 1/4 round that is larger then ya can find a beveld cap molding on top of the base board that is 3/8thick and 23/4 wide and a l shaped molding that has a different stile then ya can find . The remodle was not that much money the cost of building a wood working shop was . Not sure if there was more old plaster hauled out of here or wood chips and sawdust . Wich remonds me i still have some L cap molding to make and get up on two winders and around the new ft. door we installed , one of my better ideas to replace the old falling apart 30 inch ft. door with a new fancy 36 inch door . I also did as the old carpenter did i signed and dated all the trim on the back . As he signed and dated his work Joesph West Nov.1892

All the houses I've built have gotten sprayed with lacquer. Stinky stuff. Not so much a preservative as a protectant, as it doesn't soak in. Seems to hold up well.

Ben

I used the water based poly on my kitchen cabinets and would never use again. We stripped the old finish and applied a stain. The product's were all MinWax. The water base poly went on great and made a great finish which really looked good and I liked. The problem being that after a short while the finish near the pulls started to wear off bad and produced somewhat of a sticky surface, hard to clean. Made a really nice overall finish, but I would never use again.

I use oil base poly. I prefer satin but some customers request semi-gloss and a very few choose flat.

Apply the first coat. Let it dry thoroughly.
Lightly sand with 220 or higher grade sandpaper.
Wipe it down with a tack rag.
Apply a second coat.

In most cases 2 coats is sufficient. With some porous species of wood you might need to repeat the sanding, tacking and apply a 3rd coat.

Wipe on poly has not favorably impressed me.
Same for water based poly.

The biggest problem with Minwax poly is it doesn't flow well and may need to be thinned.

Use a high quality bristle brush.
If I have a lot of flush doors to finish I'll sometimes apply the poly with a short nap roller and back brush with a good brush.

Work in an area that is free of dust. You'll want enough ventilation to clear out the fumes but not so much as to stir up dust.

Turn off pilot lights and air out the house to remove flammable fumes before relighting them.

In my younger days I did a lot of wood work for trim/doors/cabinets. What I did was use the minwax interior stain and then use Minwax wipe on Polyurethane. This was $10 per quart 10+ years ago. This wipe on poly was the quickest to use with the best results, very little sanding.
I have used linseed oil, but this was more work of sanding and all that crap. Time was important.

There are some water based polys that won't do that - but user has to find out by trial-and-error which ones are good.

I used satin finish poly on all my wood interior doors and trim. Lightly sanded between the 2 coats.

Urethane is fine if you're sure you'll never need to remove it. Traditional finishes such as spar varnish and tung oil are less durable but easier to repair.

I used water based satin Zar over Minwax Golden Oak stain on oak. It has been up for 10 yearss and still looks great. I use Minwax Tung oil finish on my furniture projects. Makes a very "soft" appearing finish that holds up well, but takes about four hand rubbed coats to do a good job.

I (now) like the water based finishes. Used a floor finish, 2 coats, on a red oak floor over MinWax oil stain in the kitchen and dining room. After 10 years it still looks almost new. Doesn't stand up to dog pee however! Finally got that mutt trained.