Wood staining

Posted by Mark on March 3, 2010 at 12:34pm
I was curious about various recipes I've heard mentioned around here for making staining solutions by putting iron nails in vinegar. So I decided to do some research. On a woodworking forum I came across some explanations from people who clearly had a knowledge of chemistry and who said the effect was actually the result of iron ions in the solution reacting with tannins in the wood. They went on to suggest iron sulphate dissolved in water would achieve the same reaction with less fuss.

By chance I had some iron sulphate, which was sold to me by a garden centre for the purpose of killing moss in my lawn. So I decided to test it as a stain. I've just posted some photos of my initial results along with a few notes. Not sure what to conclude yet - I think I probably need to try a few variations. Hope this might be of interest to others.

The following link should lead to the album containing the photos:

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/photo/albums/wood-stain-experiments


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Tags: iron, nails, stains, sulphate
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  • Mark June 4, 2010 at 1:53pm
    PS. Watch out with this stuff - I got around to using it on my lawn not so long back and because I was using large quantities and trying to cover a big area I ended up getting quite a bit on my hands...which ended up stained to look like I'd been working down the pit.
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