I'm Steve Maxwell and I want to show you the secret to making the most of wood
which is finishing. And finishing that not only looks good, but it's also easy to prepare. I've
got some samples here of water-based urethane finish that I want to show you. As you can see
it comes in a whole bunch of different colors. You needn't use these non-traditional colors
the regular brown or even unstained and clearly sealed is an option. But whatever you choose
there are some techniques you have to put into practice if you want that wood to look great
Let's get started right now with the first part of the process, which is sanding. To show you
exactly how to apply this kind of finish, I'm going to use this piece of pine board. It's top
grade wood and it's as smooth as you can expect wood to be coming from the lumberyard, but there's
still a problem with it. You might be tempted to put a finish directly on this wood, but that would
be a huge mistake. You'd never get good results unless you do some sanding first. Take a close
look and I'll show you what I mean. On the surface, if you look closely, you'll see the undulation
marks left behind by the thickness planer that smoothened this wood. It's those marks that you
need to take off and the first tool you use for that is the belt sander
Well, I've just gone over the wood with a 100 grit belt in the belt sander and I've
removed all of those mill marks you saw a few seconds ago. The thing is though, that the belt
sander is still a fairly coarse tool. Even if I had a very fine belt on that sander, it's still
likely to leave gouges and scratches. If I didn't hold the sander exactly parallel to the grain
there's going to be some cross-grain scratching there. It's very hard to see at this stage
but it comes right out when you put the stain on it. So that's why I have step two
which is using this half sheet vibrating sander. The key to using the half sheet vibrating sander
is to use it with a light pressure. I've got 120 grit sandpaper on here and I was moving it back
and forth with the grain. The results are considerably smoother than with the belt
sander. To be honest, I could probably go right to stain right now, but just to make sure I've
got a flawless surface, there is a third sanding step. It doesn't take very long. It's similar to
this one, but it uses a quarter sheet finishing sander, a palm sander, which we'll also use later
on for our between coat sanding. But for now, we're just going to use it to refine the wood
that last little bit before we start putting some liquid on this piece of pine
The quarter sheet finishing sander is a great tool. It's small and light. In this case
I've used 180 grit sandpaper for that final sanding pass on the wood before we get to the
staining and urethane. When I come to use this for sanding between coats, which I'll explain in a
minute or two, I'll switch to 220 grit paper in that case. If you can, vacuum the surface clean
Dust is your enemy at this stage. Now, if you're working on a job site, you could use a shop vac
or even a hand broom used vigorously will probably be enough. But sanding wood is entirely different
operation than finishing wood. Finishing has got to be done in a surgically clean situation
and that's what we're creating now. At this stage, you have a choice to make. Well
you've probably made the choice before, but you're going to go in one of two directions right now. You can either stain the wood. They've got a range of colors here. There's a
traditional brownish color and a red and a blue, or you can go directly to sealing the finish
You'll need to seal on top of the stain too. In this case, we're using a water-based urethane
but if you're going to go with staining, then there's a step you need to do before you add
the color, and that's the application of a pre-stain conditioner. What that does is it
evens out the absorbency of the wood so you get much more smooth color
Water-based products have very low odor, and they dry very quickly. You might be wondering, though
if it's water-based, isn't the finish water-soluble? These products are water-soluble and water clean up when they're wet, but as they dry, they undergo a chemical change
that makes them insoluble in water. They're actually quite a tough and durable finish
Another advantage is that they don't yellow with age. If you want to preserve a
very white finish on the wood, then a water-based urethane on its own is the way to go
Now, this is the pre-stain conditioner, and I've applied an even coat
and we're going to let that dry before we come back and put some stain on
I'm going to let this dry for 15 to 30 minutes before I put the stain on
but before I do, I'm just going to wipe off all the excess. We don't want any of the pre-stain
conditioner sealing the surface or forming a film on it. We just want to slake the thirst of that
bare wood. Pre-stain conditioner has done its job. It's soaked in. We've wiped it off. It's
dried a little bit. If you detect any roughness at all, go over it with a piece of 240-grit sandpaper
in your hand, and that'll remove any of the grain that was raised as it soaked up the
water-based conditioner. Before you get started with the stain, give it a good stir. There's
pigments that you need to churn up from the bottom. When the color of the stain becomes
consistent, then you know you've got it completely mixed. Now comes the fun part, putting on some
stain. You want to put it on fairly thick. You're going to wipe it off again, just like we did with
the conditioner. When it goes on, it looks just like paint, but that's not what stain's all about
When we wipe it, we're going to reveal some of the wood grain underneath, and that's what makes
this combination look so good. The Minwax water-based stains that I prefer come in lots of
non-traditional colors like you see here, as well as a whole bunch of shades of brown, if you want
to stick with something more conventional. This, of course, is water-based stain that we've just put
on, and it dries fairly quickly, so you don't want to let the stain sit on the wood for too long
before you wipe it off, revealing that all-important wood grain underneath. And you do want to remove everything from the surface. It's only the liquid that's soaked in
below the surface that you want to remain. We've got the stain on the wood, and it's got to be
allowed to dry completely before the next step. Now, one note of caution. This doesn't really look
all that impressive yet, even though it's a really good staining job. The reason is because it doesn't
have the depth of color that the urethane brings out. What you need to do next is to coat with one
coat of urethane and let it dry. Then give it another coat of urethane, that's the second one
and when it's completely dry, lightly sand the surface with 220 grit sandpaper, either in the
quarter sheet palm sander I showed you before, or by hand in any intricate areas. Give it a third coat
but don't sand after that last coat. What you're probably going to find at that stage is that the
urethane looks something like this sample. This is pretty typical, especially when you're using
water-based urethanes. As you can see, there are some bumps, little specks of dust have fallen on
the surface and hardened there. Because water-based urethane dries so quickly, there's likely to be
brush marks. If there were any bubbles in the liquid as you put it on, they might harden in
place too. It looks pretty ugly. What you need to do to fix this is something that I've never seen
anyone else do before with water-based urethanes, but it works really well. That's using a random
orbit sander with a 3M rubbing pad to refine that surface and bring it up to a beautiful
shiny, silky gloss like you see here on this sample