How to get more durable wood, without stabalization.

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So I'm working on a saya for a kitchen knife right now. It's at the stage where its pretty much ready for glue up, but before I do this I wanted to see what my options are to possibly get the wood to be a bit more durable than it is right now.

The wood is fairly highly figured, spalted water oak. Which is really the only reason I'm concerned about this at all. I cut off just enough to make this saya, and I have a block that is big enough to make one or two handles depending what I decide to do with it. If it ends up being used for handles I'm likely going to send it off to be properly stabilized. However since the wood I'm using right now is just going to be a saya, I'm not as concerned with the durability. It shouldn't see too much stress over its life.

If no one has any suggestions, my current plan is to maybe get a good bit of oil soaked into it then do a poly finish over that. I think that may be good enough for what I'm asking or this particular wood. However if anyone has something they would suggest to do in this situation I would love to hear it.
 
I’ve used Tru-Oil on spalted pecan scales for a skinner. I’ve used it to skin several whitetail and other miscellaneous tasks and has been washed and tossed around. It’s taken it and held up well probably about 5 years old now. The rest of that batch was sent to K&G for stabilization. The Tru-Oil did add a bit of a yellow tint to it.
I’d recommend putting on 6-8 coats and buffing with 0000 steel wool between coats.
 
3fifty7 said:
I’ve used Tru-Oil on spalted pecan scales for a skinner. I’ve used it to skin several whitetail and other miscellaneous tasks and has been washed and tossed around. It’s taken it and held up well probably about 5 years old now. The rest of that batch was sent to K&G for stabilization. The Tru-Oil did add a bit of a yellow tint to it.
I’d recommend putting on 6-8 coats and buffing with 0000 steel wool between coats.
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Good to know.
 
EngrSorenson said:
A classic pen turning trick is to use CA glue. A little tricky to use, but the wood absorbs it and you can get a lasting, durable finish that always appears “wet”.
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I have seen this used here and there, I've never considered doing it myself. Well, I've used it to fill gaps, but you get what I'm saying.

Do people generally use the low viscosity stuff for this kind of finish? Also how is it applied? I'll probably give it a search on youtube to get the fine details on how I should go about it, if I go in that direction.
 
Low viscosity, use sandpaper while it's still wet to get sawdust packed down in the pores and imperfections.

After that there's a couple different ways to finish. One, continue sanding and flushing with thin glue till you reach your final grit, then buff. That'll get you a pretty, mat, natural wood look. Not the "wet" look.

If you want the wet look, after you get the pores filled, put a coat of thin ca on, let it dry, then smooth out all the imperfections with high grit sandpaper. Then do another. Keep going until all the imperfections are gone, then scrub with de-oiled 0000 steel wool. Then rub with can glue de-bond, and let dry. You gotta do the last step somewhere as dust free as possible or you'll end up with dust and dog hair in you otherwise glassy finish.
 
Honestly I’ve never gone through that much trouble as stated above. but I’m no professional. It’s fast to apply, so try it out on a piece of scrap first and you’ll get an idea of its effectiveness and its benefits.

I do recommend starting with “thin” CA glue to permeate the wood
 
If you soak it in oil and let it dry really well but not by overheating - just air dry for no less than 72 hours then top coat with a film finish such as urethane, or varnish, or even wax, you will have created a perfectly durable saya. All the extra work is - well - extra. Get the surface sanded down to at least 320 but higher is better before you apply the oil. Before you add the top coat, lightly sand again with the next higher or 2 grits. The oil will clog your sandpaper so don't be cheap, use clean squares as you work. Maybe 5 minutes of effort. Then apply your surface treatment per product instructions. My 2¢
 
RayseM said:
If you soak it in oil and let it dry really well but not by overheating - just air dry for no less than 72 hours then top coat with a film finish such as urethane, or varnish, or even wax, you will have created a perfectly durable saya. All the extra work is - well - extra. Get the surface sanded down to at least 320 but higher is better before you apply the oil. Before you add the top coat, lightly sand again with the next higher or 2 grits. The oil will clog your sandpaper so don't be cheap, use clean squares as you work. Maybe 5 minutes of effort. Then apply your surface treatment per product instructions. My 2¢
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Sort of the original thought I had. If I go this route, I've seen 2 ways of doing the oil. The first is the normal hand rubbed oil finish. The other is literally soaking the wood in the oil. Which are you thinking?
 
Do you have soft spots in that wood? Use ca glue just on them. Rest oil finish. Simplest and should be plant durable for a saya as others mentioned.

As someone already stated PU lacquer would be a possibility for more protection.

If the wood is way too soft and/or partially rotten you can consider finishing/stabilizing it with epoxy resin as well. Mix 2k epoxy and thin it with about 5% alcohol. Use old cotton rags or an old brush you can throw away for application. Saturate everything, open pore wood will really take the solution. Hang it to cure, sand back starting with 120 grit and then apply oil or PU finish. Epoxy might darken your spalted wood though and you might lose some of the finer detail in the figure. It will harden the wood considerably. If you have some wood leftovers and epoxy at home try with a small piece first.
 
FredyCro said:
Do you have soft spots in that wood? Use ca glue just on them. Rest oil finish. Simplest and should be plant durable for a saya as others mentioned.

As someone already stated PU lacquer would be a possibility for more protection.

If the wood is way too soft and/or partially rotten you can consider finishing/stabilizing it with epoxy resin as well. Mix 2k epoxy and thin it with about 5% alcohol. Use old cotton rags or an old brush you can throw away for application. Saturate everything, open pore wood will really take the solution. Hang it to cure, sand back starting with 120 grit and then apply oil or PU finish. Epoxy might darken your spalted wood though and you might lose some of the finer detail in the figure. It will harden the wood considerably. If you have some wood leftovers and epoxy at home try with a small piece first.
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Thanks for the suggestion.

Nothing that is left after shaping, and cutting off the excess seems to be soft or rotten. I just asked this because I know that highly figured wood, and spalted wood can both have some difficulties that woods with straight grain (and without spalting) wont face. It seems like I've really gotten very lucky with this particular wood though. Not only is it beautiful. I've been letting it sit in my room the last few days while I deside how I'm going to approach finishing it. With it cut to the final thinness, flattened, then with the area for the blade routed, and chiseled out. And it really seems to be in good condition. It seems to have not been bothered going from the hot, humid weather that it has been drying in outside to inside in the dryer cooler a/c at all.

I really can't Express enough how much I wish I would have kept more of this particular part of the tree. I would have just sent off a bunch for stabilization, and had a ton for some beautiful handles.

Anyway, back to what you said. The epoxy stabilization seems like a good idea to me. I may actually use this for the pin I make to secure the blade in, and use the oil, and poly finish for the body of it. I think the pin will likely be the part that will see the most stress.
 
it was common before inexpensive (relatively) epoxies and vacuum resin treatments to soak wood in boiled linseed oil or some other drying oil, let the oil cure and then pore fill and finish.

But this was done only on things exposed to a lot of changes in moisture and I don't know if it was ever done with manufactured knives. It's common in tools.

thin CA with a warmed wood sample, and thinned epoxy warmed with a warm wood sample (so that the wood sucks in the CA and epoxy as it cools) are two things that I can think of that will help durability.

using wood that's several years old and not just partially wet or just out of the kiln in the last month is also useful - 20 year old wood is far more stable than 1 year old wood. Also less easy to find.

If you're thinking of making knife handles for customers who will completely disregard care instructions, though, the reasonable methods may fail where a full resin treatment will.

You can find instructions online to thin or extend epoxy open time for penetration if you want to go that route.

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I have less experience than a pro knife maker would with resin treatment, though I did have someone who was trialing resin treatment send me handle material made of bubinga. I don't know if they were hoping to go into business selling infused wood, but they had the equipment that does the same thing for some other reason (something metallurgical or some other resin use, not sure - could've been oil-filling something....dont' know). My point with this is they followed the data sheet for a product and sent me handles that weren't infused all the way through, so when I turned them down in a lathe for a tool handle, what I had left was just pretty much bare wood. I told them that and I think they didn't believe me, but I guess they also didn't cut any of the blanks that they made to see it for themselves. Another lesson that nothing can be used without testing and checking a couple of samples first - it'd be a disaster to figure that out in the middle of time sensitive paying work.
 
D-weaver said:
it was common before inexpensive (relatively) epoxies and vacuum resin treatments to soak wood in boiled linseed oil or some other drying oil, let the oil cure and then pore fill and finish.

But this was done only on things exposed to a lot of changes in moisture and I don't know if it was ever done with manufactured knives. It's common in tools.

thin CA with a warmed wood sample, and thinned epoxy warmed with a warm wood sample (so that the wood sucks in the CA and epoxy as it cools) are two things that I can think of that will help durability.

using wood that's several years old and not just partially wet or just out of the kiln in the last month is also useful - 20 year old wood is far more stable than 1 year old wood. Also less easy to find.

If you're thinking of making knife handles for customers who will completely disregard care instructions, though, the reasonable methods may fail where a full resin treatment will.

You can find instructions online to thin or extend epoxy open time for penetration if you want to go that route.

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I have less experience than a pro knife maker would with resin treatment, though I did have someone who was trialing resin treatment send me handle material made of bubinga. I don't know if they were hoping to go into business selling infused wood, but they had the equipment that does the same thing for some other reason (something metallurgical or some other resin use, not sure - could've been oil-filling something....dont' know). My point with this is they followed the data sheet for a product and sent me handles that weren't infused all the way through, so when I turned them down in a lathe for a tool handle, what I had left was just pretty much bare wood. I told them that and I think they didn't believe me, but I guess they also didn't cut any of the blanks that they made to see it for themselves. Another lesson that nothing can be used without testing and checking a couple of samples first - it'd be a disaster to figure that out in the middle of time sensitive paying work.
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I certainly plan to have the piece that I want to use for handles done correctly, by a professional. (What is the company everyone recommends? Kmd k and d? Or g idk, I'll look into it when the time comes). The saya should be fine with just these home methods though. I have some 100% pure linseed oil that I did my own (well close to it, without the pressure cooker) boiling process with, also some tung oil finish that is more similar to modern boiled linseed oil, with the chemical drying agents.
 
Ok I'm letting the saya soak in linseed oil. I've heard people mention overnight, to 24 hours. I'll do a bit of research and see when I want to take them out.

https://imgur.com/akLqxZC

I ended up putting a quarter on each piece to slightly keep then weighed down.
 
So. I'll update. I took it out of the oil right after I posted that. Then put some of the tung oil finish on it.

Since I've been planning to do final shaping, and finishing after the saya is glued up I'm doing a bit of that now, just to see what kind of penetration just that short soak had on the wood. Also before I put it back in, or move forward on that again I'll wait for your thoughts.

I will say, I'm planning to have a poly coat on the entire surface afterwards, except where the saya glues up. So it should be sealed very well.
 
Pardon if I missed i, but do you have any other offcuts that you can also soak
Blankblank said:
Ok I'm letting the saya soak in linseed oil. I've heard people mention overnight, to 24 hours. I'll do a bit of research and see when I want to take them out.

https://imgur.com/akLqxZC

I ended up putting a quarter on each piece to slightly keep then weighed down.
Click to expand...

How long for raw linseed oil depends on the wood. I've used it (raw) often to add weight to planes where the density of beech sapwood is a little lacking. When it's used in beech, we block the bottom of the plane mortise and fill the mortise with linseed oil over night. By the morning, the oil is coming out of the end grain on the ends of the plane and if you pick a poorly sawn blank, on the sides where the grain runs out.

VwbO2RQ.jpg


But it's less fast in other things. The easiest way to tell what it will do is to do a separate test piece and cut it.

I'm not familiar with the dryers in tung oil vs boiled linseed oil, but if they are the same, it'll probably speed everything up. I couldn't tell you if uncured linseed oil in the middle will ever be a problem - it hasn't been for me, but I rarely make anything without a transition coat of dewaxed shellac if there's any question. It sticks to anything, the oil will pass through it if it's drying to the wood and you can wipe it off of the top of the shellac, and then when you've confirmed there's nothing drying on it, you can apply polyrethane to it. It should be dewaxed shellac if you consider doing that, though.

Planes are just waxed, otherwise I'd have a better answer about adhesion with uncured oil. A look at kleen strip's MSDS would probably quickly answer whether or not the drying chemistry in tung oil and BLO is the same.

Sorry about the big picture - I don't know how to scale it down.
 
D-weaver said:
Pardon if I missed i, but do you have any other offcuts that you can also soak


How long for raw linseed oil depends on the wood. I've used it (raw) often to add weight to planes where the density of beech sapwood is a little lacking. When it's used in beech, we block the bottom of the plane mortise and fill the mortise with linseed oil over night. By the morning, the oil is coming out of the end grain on the ends of the plane and if you pick a poorly sawn blank, on the sides where the grain runs out.

VwbO2RQ.jpg


But it's less fast in other things. The easiest way to tell what it will do is to do a separate test piece and cut it.

I'm not familiar with the dryers in tung oil vs boiled linseed oil, but if they are the same, it'll probably speed everything up. I couldn't tell you if uncured linseed oil in the middle will ever be a problem - it hasn't been for me, but I rarely make anything without a transition coat of dewaxed shellac if there's any question. It sticks to anything, the oil will pass through it if it's drying to the wood and you can wipe it off of the top of the shellac, and then when you've confirmed there's nothing drying on it, you can apply polyrethane to it. It should be dewaxed shellac if you consider doing that, though.

Planes are just waxed, otherwise I'd have a better answer about adhesion with uncured oil. A look at kleen strip's MSDS would probably quickly answer whether or not the drying chemistry in tung oil and BLO is the same.

Sorry about the big picture - I don't know how to scale it down.
Click to expand...
Yeah I have some off cuts I can soak. I'll try a couple ways maybe post some pictures, and see what happens.
 
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