Thread: What's Your favorite wood-scale finish?

With all the options–lacquer, shellac, epoxy resin, rubbing oil & wax, gorilla or super glue, what is your favorite finish on wood scales? I'm wondering because I want to do another restore and I only have lacquer experience so far.

I like olive wood and ho wood. I have both on my kitchen knives, and they work very well in wet greasy conditions without any special finishes.

The superglue/CA is a super durable finish that leaves a rich and deep look, but the fumes are a killer. The oils & waxes are fine on the more oily woods like ebony, cocoabolo & such. I've always been a fan of Minwax's Helmsman & sometimes you can find it in a spray can. I use different finishes for each look that I am after.

Experiment...you can always sand it down and try another or try again!

Bar top finish (epoxy resin) is what I use. Tried the CA but hated working with it. A lot of the rose woods (like cocobolo) will not take a normal finish. Since the wood is so naturally oily finishes like polyurethane will not set correctly. The finis will stay gooey. For those woods the only thing I have found that works is a catalysed urethane or epoxy resin.

I like CA, epoxy or liquefied acrylic. I have to say that it depends on the wood as well as the shape of the scales or the blade, but most of the time its one of the three mentioned above.

That is valuable information, I didn't know oily woods won't take polyurethane. That probably just saved me a lot of frustration on my next restore...thanks!

The big one is cocobolo but anything in the rosewood family can be finicky. Best to put some finish on a scrap to see how it behaves first. Olive can also be picky at times. Finishes like catalyzed urethane and epoxy use a chemical hardener unlike oil and polyurethane which have a volatile that evaporates leaving behind the resin. Those chemically hardened finishes tend to be much more durable and work on about anything but they can also be more difficult and expensive to use. Take catalyzed urethane, mix it and use it without the proper respirator and your lungs will turn into peanut butter.

I like Tru-Oil

Some woods are simply best left alone...

I'm a fan of the CA finish buffed out with some floor/wood wax afterwards. That's pretty much my standard...