Finishing for teak wood furniture

 Transparent finish for teak wood furniture

Teak wood is already known as the superior timber since long time ago. Teak wood has been used for many purposes for long time. Teak wood has a very nice and attractive appearance. He has a strong grain character with nice pattern and pores and also unique pores, with brown base color that are very interesting look. Therefore, the teak wood product is already attractive although in unfinished condition. Lot of teak furniture product are market in unfinished, moreover mostly the teak wood are used for outdoor furniture. But with so many new models and the development of market appetite, so now many people are doing finishing for teak wood furniture to obtain the desired appearance. The finishing to the teak wood will provide protection and also enhance to the beauty of teak wood. The proper finishing can provide high added value to the teak wood. But some improper finishing sometimes can kill the beauty of teak wood. Therefore the appropriate finishing is very important to provide great added value to the products of teak wood product. 

Before choosing the appropriate finishing we should have recognized the properties and character of teak wood.

• The grain and pore of the teak wood. 

Teak wood has a very strong character and beautiful grain pattern. The finishing with transparent color is the most appropriate. The transparent finish will enhance the beauty of the grain pattern. The proper application of stain and glaze will maximize the beauty of wood grain and pores to produce an attractive appearance. We should avoid too thick stain, since it could cover the character of the grain and kill its beauty. The dark brown or light brown color will give nice look for teak wood.

Antique finish for teak wood will give a nice look and many people like this finish. But for the modern design, the clean finish is also good choice. The teak wood has big and deep pores, so we should use filler to fill its pores and grain.

The finishing with opaque or solid color for teak wood should be avoided since it will cover and even close the beauty the wood grains and pores. The solid color also has high risk of getting problem with the teak oil. 

•  Color wood base

Teak wood as well as other tree, is the product of the living creatures that their properties depend on how he lived also. The teak wood may have variation properties depend on his sources. One of his characters that could vary is the: base color and the grain and pore pattern. The basic color of the teak wood may vary, ranging from white, light brown, slightly red to the dark brown and even black. To anticipate this, then when do finishing for teak wood, we need to choose the proper stain application to get the final color needed. The uses of sap stain and equalizer stain is very important to get the uniform and even final color. 

The variation or wood base color in the teak wood

• Oil in teak wood 

Teak wood has oil that is called teak oil inside. The teak oil is useful to prevent the wood from insect attack, it makes the teak wood is more durable. But the oil will ruin the finishing for solid color especially the white color. The oil will out from the wood and seem obviously in the finish. The oil will appear as a yellow stain in the grain in the finish. For transparent color especially for brown color, the oil will invisible, but for solid colors, especially for white color, the oil will seem obviously and will ruin the appearance. That way finishing with solid color on the teak should be avoided since the risk of teak oil that would interfere with performance finishing produced.
There are some finishing materials are designed to block and withstand the oil in teak. But the fact is nobody can guarantee that the material will work 100%. After a certain time usually the teak oil will come through and appear in the finish. The risk of teak oil will be greater if the wood used is still not dry. The dry teak wood, with the moisture content 10% or lower will reduce the possibility of the teak oil problem.

There are other ways that can be done to overcome the teak oil problem, by boil the teak wood. Teak wood after been cut, need to be boiled for several hours, so the oil is released from the wood. After this then we can continued with the drying process and the next production processes.

Although there are some ways to overcome the teak oil problems, but the right choice for finishing teak wood is to select the proper finishing. Especially considering that the art of finishing is the process to enhance the elements that already exist to produce an attractive appearance. Therefore we should not impose finishing with color that does not match with the nature of wood. Solid color instead of high risk to have problems with oil, this finish will also cover and kill the natural beauty of teak. For furniture products with solid colors it is better to use material from other types of wood that is cheaper and also safer without the risk of teak oil.. 

The teak oil will come out and seem obviously on white finish