[Shop-talk] Choosing exterior wood stain

[Galt, Stuart A]

Wow,

What timing!  I will be putting up the final boards on my 320' of cedar
fence this evening and will be very curious to hear what stain to use
as well.

Stuart.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Karl Vacek [mailto:kvacek at ameritech.net]
> Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2007 12:34 PM
> To: shop-talk at autox.team.net
> Subject: [Shop-talk] Choosing exterior wood stain
>
> We're getting a new cedar fence and arbor - about 250 feet,
> roughly half 6'
> and half 4', so it will take a lot of stain and time.  It's
> an incredibly heavy fence (no Home Depot specials here), so
> it's likely to last a long time, and I want to keep it
> looking good for a long time too.  Naturally I want to stain
> it immediately, especially the part that will be against the
> evil neighbor's fence and will be unavailable to us to stain
> again till she moves or whatever.
>
> I've always used the old-fashioned penetrating oil stains for
> just about anything I've ever stained, indoor or outdoor.
> However, there's lots of evidence that a solid stain (I call
> that thin paint...) protects and lasts better for exterior
> applications.  And cedar doesn't have that much of a grain,
> particularly in a fence that you mostly see from a distance
> anyway, so I guess a solid is OK if it's really better.
>
> Test results are confusing and hard to follow.  Consumer
> Reports, an organization I don't always trust anyway, just
> rated lots of stains, but none of the most-premium ones we
> see right now on shelves from the same manufacturers that
> they rated (Behr, Olympic, Cabot, etc.).  They did, however,
> echo the solid vs transparent durability issue I've been
> hearing from paint dealers.
>
> I'm kind of intrigued with the hybrid (my term, not the
> manufacturers') products with acrylic and alkyd oils in the
> same formulation.  Many are water clean-up, which really
> doesn't matter to me, but it's not a bad thing IF the
> material is durable and protects the wood well.  But I really
> just don't know much about current products.
>
> Soooo...  Anyone BTDT recently ??  Any paint chemists on the list ?
>
> Thanks!
> Karl
> _______________________________________________