Your finish going to waste?

[P.W.Berkuta]

Once you open the bottle or can your finish will start to setup and eventually become useless. I find if I re-bottle it in small containers it will last me a lot longer-- also storing it up-side-down helps.

[David Rase]

I just put down my latest copy of Woodsmith Magazine.  In the tips section was another finish storing suggestion.  The guy who sent in the tip uses collapsible water bottles, the kind used for backpacking, to pour his excess finish into.  Once out of the quart can he squeezes all the air out of the bottle and no skin on top of the finish like when it is left in a can.
Dave

[Eric Laird]

Bloxygen (available in Woodcraft stores or online) works well also. It's an inert heavier-than-air gas (argon, I think -should be listed in the MSDS) that displaces the air in the container so the contents are not exposed to oxygen. When you pick up a bottle of it, it almost feels empty but mine has lasted three or four years and it works great. I just picked up a new bottle simply because I figure the old one has to be almost empty!
Eric

[smart dog]

It also helps simply to add some clean pebbles or marbles to fill up the airspace and store upside down.

dave

[The other DWS]

I have used a lot of straight "Tung oil" as a stock finish on a bunch of different guns as well as on other wood products.  It oxidizes and sets up relatively quickly.  An old cabinet maker showed me to pour clean nuts and bolts into the bottom to keep the level up in the neck of the bottle.  a thin plug will develop but you can pierce it with an awl and use what you need.  no reason to have a large half inch or larger opening to let air in.

[kutter]

When I did use some TruOil (and I haven't since the 70's!) I tried the marbles in the container trick to keep it from going to waste.
I still have a container on the shelf of hardened TruOil complete with decorative marbles cast into place inside the compound & jar. It's just for lookin',,as they say.

My Permalyn finish did the same more recently. First time I used the stuff and didn't think about it going bad. The finish itself rather quickly,,the sealer didn't turn for almost a year.


I'll go back to putting it up into small prescription bottles again like I used to do with other finishes.
That worked well, air tight & most of us at this age have more than a few of those containers around.

Maybe I'll carve my precious cats-eye marbles out of the fossilized Tru-oil and use them for spacer in the med bottles.
Though the use of some clean cheap bolts/screws/nuts or pebbles is a good one.

[The other DWS]

one other thing I was told,  not to let finish that is starting to "set" like on an applicator cloth come directly into contact with the finish in the bottle.  I had been holding the cloth over the bottle mouth and tipping or squeezing to re-wet the cloth.  I was told, maybe old-cabinetmaker's tale, that the drying finish can catalyze the stuff still in the bottle, causing it to set up quicker.  To always pour or squeeze it on to the applicator or into a working saucer with out direct physical contact