What to use on quality wood handles?

R

rifon2

Joined
Oct 9, 2005
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Received a few wood-handled knives recently.

A couple of customs, and some real nice production pieces.

I'm wondering what - if anything - to apply to the wood to enhance its natural patina, highlight the grain, and increase its durability.

A woodworker I know mentioned "tung oil" as excellent, but recommended diluting it with mineral spirits in a very specific ratio.
(I don't really want to get that complicated.)

Any thoughts, comments, recommendations?


Thanks.
 
Used to use Minwax tung oil ( not a true tung oil from what I gather)

Last year or so I've been using this stuff , works great.


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Of course if you just wanted to oil 'em up you could try this , works GREAT on furniture too. :D
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I use tung oil on all my wooden tool handles: knives, axes, shovels, etc. Just follow the instructions on the can.
 
Don't mean to step on Rebeltf's toes but, I would definitely stay away from the Tru-Oil unless you want a more permanent varnish type of finish. After applying Tru-Oil, the wood will start to look more like plastic and if you do not like the look, the only way to remove it would be to sand it off. I only use Tru-Oil on raw, untreated woods.
 
JoHnYKwSt said:
Don't mean to step on Rebeltf's toes but, I would definitely stay away from the Tru-Oil unless you want a more permanent varnish type of finish. After applying Tru-Oil, the wood will start to look more like plastic and if you do not like the look, the only way to remove it would be to sand it off. I only use Tru-Oil on raw, untreated woods.
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Great point and one I sort of thought of , as in , if he had a very valuable knife that refinishing the scales might have knocked down the value or historical significance , then the Howards would work , or similiar. :)
 
Thanks for the information, guys.

I've been doing some research of my own as well, and so far have heard from several good sources that pure tung oil is really excellent.
The two top choices I've heard are pure tung oil and boiled linseed oil. (Boiled linseed oil over raw linseed oil.)

I've also heard that there's no need to apply anything at all to certain types of wood which have a high content of their own natural oils.
Teak and cocobolo are a couple of examples; I guess there are others as well.
 
Tung oil and linseed oil are finishes-good ones if properly applied.
But they are not maintenance items. Use wax. It doesn't soak into the wood, can be removed if necessary, and won't hurt values. It can be reapplied easily.
Bill
 
Pure tung oil must be mixed and prepared to be ready for application. Boiled is ready out of the can. I recommend boiled, followed by shellac, followed by your choice of finishes (varnish, poly, etc) or waxes.
 
If you have either PURE tung or linseed, you will need to thin it with either turpentine or mineral spirits. Linseed oil darkens the wood, tung oil hardly at all. A thinned solution of either (1:4 or thinner) is best if the wood has no previous finish. As usual with finishing, several thin coats are supperior to fewer, thicker coats. The thinner solutions will carry the oil deeper into the wood and create a result more like the stabilized woods you see on custom handles.

I make walking stick and spoons from native woods and use diluted tung oil as my usual finish. If you really want a nice finish, use fine sandpaper (finer than 320 grit) to work in the coats. Undiluted oils and high humidity can result in gummy finishes. Thinned coats applied with fine waterproof sandpaper and lower humidities will make everybody adore your handles.

And OF COURSE, NEVER put them in the dishwasher or soak them!
 
mrjed said:
If you have either PURE tung or linseed, you will need to thin it with either turpentine or mineral spirits. Linseed oil darkens the wood, tung oil hardly at all. A thinned solution of either (1:4 or thinner) is best if the wood has no previous finish. As usual with finishing, several thin coats are supperior to fewer, thicker coats. The thinner solutions will carry the oil deeper into the wood and create a result more like the stabilized woods you see on custom handles.

I make walking stick and spoons from native woods and use diluted tung oil as my usual finish. If you really want a nice finish, use fine sandpaper (finer than 320 grit) to work in the coats. Undiluted oils and high humidity can result in gummy finishes. Thinned coats applied with fine waterproof sandpaper and lower humidities will make everybody adore your handles.

And OF COURSE, NEVER put them in the dishwasher or soak them!
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Of course! :)

Thanks for the detailed info.
I do have some pure tung oil, but I don't intend on using it until I know some more about it and the various other choices mentioned here.
 
StretchNM said:
Pure tung oil must be mixed and prepared to be ready for application. Boiled is ready out of the can. I recommend boiled, followed by shellac, followed by your choice of finishes (varnish, poly, etc) or waxes.
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That's what I'd heard initially about pure tung oil.


Bill DeShivs said:
Tung oil and linseed oil are finishes-good ones if properly applied.
But they are not maintenance items. Use wax. It doesn't soak into the wood, can be removed if necessary, and won't hurt values. It can be reapplied easily.
Bill
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This sounds like the kind of thing I'm looking for - and I appreciate your comment about not hurting values.

Think I'll pick up a can of Renaissance Wax and try it.
 
I use Renaissance Wax. Great stuff. Commonly used by museums to restore wodden / leather artifats (so they say...), but I love this wax. Will put a shine on your wood like you don't believe.
 
I have a correction to make: it's not pure "tung" oil that must be mixed, it's pure "linseed". Boiled linseed and tung oil is ready to go.
 
PURE tung oil costs $16/pint and will become real GOO, when exposed to oxygen and humidity.
I have had many hardware clerks cheerily tell me "Yes, we have it " when it was only a blend.

Read the can. Pure tung oil has no other ingredients, and is relatively hard to find. Neither Lowe's nor Home Depot carries it. Check a good woodworking catalog like Highland Hardware in Atlant to see the differences.
 
mrjed said:
PURE tung oil costs $16/pint and will become real GOO, when exposed to oxygen and humidity.
I have had many hardware clerks cheerily tell me "Yes, we have it " when it was only a blend.

Read the can. Pure tung oil has no other ingredients, and is relatively hard to find. Neither Lowe's nor Home Depot carries it. Check a good woodworking catalog like Highland Hardware in Atlant to see the differences.
Click to expand...

I got some 100% pure tung oil and applied it to a wood handle knife that's more or less a beater.

It went on very thick, it's got a consistency similar to honey.

Wiped off all the excess, now it's drying.
It did not change the blond color of the wood at all.
Has a reasonably pleasant nutty aroma.

But I do have a gut feeling that the Renaissance Wax is what I'm looking for; looking forward to trying it out.
 
It has been my experience that Rennaissance wax is not much, if any, better than neutral shoe polish. It's a lot more expensive.
 
It might be better than shoe polish, but not any better than any other quality wax. It's expensive. Save your moeny and get a small can of Minwax at Home Depot or Lowes. Don;t be fooled by the Renaissance claims that "museum curators use it". Museum curators use all kinds of waxes.
 
The real old-timers used to swear by both tung oil (if you don't want to darken the color) and boiled linseed oil (if you do). But here's the catch - they never really completely dry. The old-timers (and this was taught to me by my grandfather, now long dead - I'm 54) used to hand rub the finish. Not a little bit; hard enough and fast enough for the friction to build up as much heat as you can stand.

I guess it's pretty easy to understand why nobody in this day and age does that anymore, but it does produce a really beautiful finish.
 
There is some truth there about the drying, Samael, but the fact is, oils don;t dry, but tung oil will. Someone said earlier that he had some tung oil that was gooey or gummy. That's because it has varnishes and urethanes in it. It'll dry, just not as quickly as other finishes. Oils won;t dry, but these finishes we're talking about will......it's the wood that never dries.

When I was a kid, my Dad gave me a Savage bolt action shotgun with a natural finish wood stock. At one point, I wanted to refinish it. I sanded it down and hand-rubbed in several ccoats of tung oil. The heat and friction are for penetration AND to warm the tung oil, making that "gooey" stuff more fluid so it'll penetrate deeper. Plus, it begins to dry in layers while you're rubbing. Very nice finish, but they're equaled and surpassed by what we're doing today.
 
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