Tung Oil

If you cut the tung oil with enough mineral spirits or some such thing it might soak in and have a similar feel to BLO; pure tung is near to a thick honey in consistency. I haven't experimented with it a lot. I made up a batch of stuff years ago that was part tung, part BLO, part citrus solvent and probably a little beeswax. Probably needs more solvent to really penetrate the handles as well as straight BLO but it leaves a nice finish, you just notice it more on the surface and need to be careful not to overcoat. I just don't feel like I get the depth of penetration with it that I do with straight BLO.
 
Hundred percent tung oil is pressed from the nut grown on a tree native to China. It has been made use of in that place for thousands of years mostly as a means to create some degree of water repellency , in the Great Wall sections are impregnated with tung oil. As a wood finish it has many particular characteristics very few of which have much bearing on axes. For handles it will give some protection from moisture and grime and darken the wood's color but isn't durable and requires continual maintenance, as with any oil finish.
So-called BLO is by definition a manufactured product, (in the mind of sound thinkers this alone will expose the condition for infinite variations and shaky ground as a basis of all comparisons. Would you compare a 2x4 with a sheet of plywood?), gotten from linseed oil pressed from Flax seeds. Processing the oil is intended simply to increase the rate of oxidation or hardening because pure linseed oil - there is your legitimate basis for comparison by the way - is slow(er) to oxidize. This basic manipulation of course does not rule out further alterations such as adding solvents, conditioners, extenders and so on and so on...
In my hand boiled linseed oil becomes quickly sticky and unpleasant to handle not to mention that traditional processes were highly toxic - less so now, we are given to understand. In addition in exchange for convenience the processing also intensifies the already present tendency of linseed oil to yellow with time which is particularly apparent on lighter colored woods like ash and maple.Tung oil, on the other hand, in the short term is simply oily to the feel and easy enough to wipe off your hands and objects with a rag and then usually I will rub my hands with fine sawdust to absorb any that's left. Rather than a yellow tint tung oil tends to reddish and brown making it more suitable for all woods left their natural color.
 
Aerosmith101 said:
How does 100% pure Tung oil compare to BLO? Do they feel the same to the hand?
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No, they don't. Tung oil forms a hard built up surface much like a lacquered handle. All the built up finishes feel slick to me when hands are sweaty. I like a bees wax blo paste as a final finish rubbing off all excess.
 
so far I've only used pure tung on my axe handles - so I can't compare to BLO. However, I can for sure say that pure Tung is not as thick as honey - not even close. its thicker than water though - maybe about like milk?
pure tung is an amber colored liquid. I have two different mixes that I use.
First is 1/2 pure tung, 1/2 citrus solvent.
second is 1/3 pure tung, 1/3 citrus solvent, 1/3 pine tar. The pine tar is about as thick as honey - at least the kind I got from tractor supply. but when added to the mix, thins right up

There may be some added benefit of adding the pine tar to the mix. I primarily do it to add color.

I used to apply multiple thin coats, but I've abandoned that method. What I do now which I really like is I rub/sponge as much oil on/into the handle as it will take in one big application, then I let it dry/cure and I'm done. I think this is better in every way - probably gets more oil into the handle and it also seems to cure faster. The last few I did, I didn't even use a cloth - as i was feeling like I was wasting the amount of oil that the cloth absorbed. What I do now is just put on rubber gloves and rub the oil into the wood with my hands. This seems to work pretty good.

It is probably possible if you do multiple thin coats and let it cure completely between coats, you may eventually be able to get tung to built up and make a hard/slick finish - but I can say for sure that none of my axes handles have this.

tung can take a while to cure. You know its cured when it stops smelling like tung oil. it can take weeks - depending on temperature, etc. with my pine tar mixture, the pine tar overpowers the tung smell initially - but that smell goes away in about a week, and then you just smell the tung - but then that will go away in a couple/few more weeks, and then you are all set. with my tung/citrus solvent mixture, the citrus smell overpowers initially, but that smell goes away pretty quickly.
 
I was probably incorrect in ascribing a honey-like viscosity to the tung oil; mostly what I remember is that it seemed like the stuff just wouldn't soak in, which in my mind makes it seem more viscous. I like the smell and feel like it does offer a little more protection from the elements but the trade of is something of a more lacquered finish if you put it on too thick. At least that's kind of what I wound up with.
 
If you like a fire hardened look you can torch your handle and then apply your Tung oil for better penetration.
I have moved to fire hardening a lot of my handles for a number of reasons:
1. I first sand with 60 grit to open the grain and then torch it--this makes the grain visibly pop which looks nice me and it gives additional grip.
2. While it is still very hot I apply Watco Danish oil which soaks rapidly into the wood.
3. Then I use the Birchwood Casey products of Tru-oil and Gun-stock Wax to get the desired sheen and depth. With the grain raising from the fire hardening, the oil finish really gives a look of depth. If you don't want much sheen when you are done with the oil finish, just hit it with the wax.
 
I like blo/beeswax/turps @ 1:1:1 a lot. I glop it on pretty liberally and let it start to polymerize pretty good (weeks) before buffing off excess.

For reeally dry wood I like to feed it castor before a finish oil.

I like tung oil a lot. I used to get the 100% stuff from Rockler. You can use it 100%, but it'll take a long time to dry. I like castor, and I may be the only one (!), but it seems to penetrate much better. Tung makes for a pretty good finish oil after feeding.
 
One other gripe I've got with linseed oil but then the "boiled" version, beyond the sticky mess it is to work with, is as follows: because the oxidizing characteristic has been manipulated, from that point on it begins to degrade and after longer periods in storage becomes overly and continually thicker or viscous requiring thinning all the more, (this can be an advantage if you are using it as a base for making putty). Regular old linseed oil, that troublesome version that causes us to actually wait a while, properly put up, will only improve with time as more and more impurities settle. In fact we have a name for this aged linseed oil, "standolie" or oil that's stood a while. Great stuff for all your needs wherever an oxidizing oil is called for.
 
I have mostly used tung oil. I put on very thin coats. Someone said tung oil doesn't dry, it cures, and in UV light it cures fast. That has been my experience: on a summer's afternoon I can get 2 or 3 thin coats done. Two day of sun exposure, and the tung oil smell is gone. Before I knew this, I would put on thick coats and leave the project in the garage and it would take days or a week to be dry to the touch.

I've used Tru-Oil some also, it is a gunstock finish. It is very fast to dry and of course doesn't need UV light to do so.
 
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