[rowjoe76]

Solution for Blotching with Watco Danish Oil on Walnut Veneer

Steve,

Thank you for your advice and quick response. This was my first time using Watco Danish Oil and you are absolutely correct...1 hour is way too long to let the oil sit. I learned that the hard way on my first piece of wood. The Oil was extremely difficult to remove after one hour. In the future I will take your advice and wipe the wood down with mineral spirits prior to oiling.

With that being said, I am an impatient man by nature, and before I was able to check my email and see that you responded I went ahead with trying to repair it on my own. Low and behold it actually worked!! In fact it made the “bad side” look even better (and smoother) than the “Good Side”. I was so happy with the results I repeated the process on the “good side”. Don’t ask me how I came up with this solution…it was honestly a shot in the dark. But one thing is for sure, great risk sometimes equals great reward.

Here is what I did:

1) I went to the local hardware store and bought Watco Danish Oil – Dark ( I was using Natural before)
2) I brushed on the dark oil liberally to the blotchy side of the ply and let it sit for 20 mins
3) After 20 minutes I wet sanded the surface with standard (not wet) #100 grit sandpaper. This made me extremely nervous since I knew the veneer was thin. But without this step I don’t believe I would have achieved the same results. (I hand sanded pretty hard too)
4) I then applied a little more oil to the surface and sanded with #150 grit sandpaper (Throughout this process I kept reapplying oil to the wood to keep it wet and to maintain a nice slurry of dust and oil. It’s also important to note that i did this in sections of approx 1ft x 1ft)
5) I repeated step 4 with #220 grit sandpaper, then again with #400 WET SANDPAPER, then with 0000 Steel Wool.
6) After I finished with the steel wool I wiped the wood down with a rag, making sure I had removed all surface oil. The difference was night and day! Soft as a baby’s butt and not a blotch to be found. I repeated the same process on the other side.
7) I’m going to let the wood dry for 48 hrs then repeat step 3 with #600 WET SANDPAPER.
8) I’m then going to finish the wood with Watco Satin Wax

One final note: There was one small section (about the size of a 50 cent piece that kept giving me trouble and would not take the oil. I hit it really hard with the #100 grit sandpaper (while wet) then reapplied a liberal amount of oil over the spot and let it sit for about 20 mins. I then rubbed the area lightly with 0000 steal wool, working the oil into the wood. It did the trick!!