The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California
Coloring Finishing And Painting Wood
Wood-Stains And Water-Stainning
13. Reasons for Staining.
1. Color harmony of the woodwork with the furnishings of a home requires staining, for wood in its natural tones does, not usually harmonize with textiles and wall colors. Changing a garish, unpleasant color to a softer more attractive one that will take a place in a color scheme is an important reason for staining.
2. Greater beauty in a particular article can often be secured by staining. This can sometimes be obtained by changing an inferior or cheap wood to make it look like an expensive, beautiful one, such as imitation mahogany finish on birch through staining; or, the coloring may bring out unsuspected qualities and beauty in the wood itself, by accentuating contrasts and bringing before the eye attractive natural characteristics which are not emphasized in the unstained material. The reaction of the stain upon flakes or cells of the medullar rays, its effect upon the mass of wood fibers, and its greater absorption by the open pores or broken cell cavities, are all elements of great surprise that are very interesting and vary with different kinds of wood.
3. Staining often tones down natural wood colors that are displeasing to the eye. Sometimes only part of a board needs to be changed in color, as in staining a streak or edge of sapwood to match the general color of the rest of the wood.
4. Sometimes staining is resorted to as a means of giving new wood an aged effect, as in weathered oak.
5. Greater durability can be obtained, where wood is exposed to the weather, through preservative stains1 made with creosote oil. Xo other finish is applied over creosote-stains. Oil-stains, if they contain certain quantities of drying-oils such as linseed-oil, will protect or preserve wood thru the varnishlike film which is left as a covering after the oil has dried.
14. Definition of Wood-Staining.—Wood-finishers are beginning to give a very definite and narrow meaning to the word staining, and, at present, generally exclude all materials that add an opaque pigment to the surface, calling such coatings, which remain largely or partly upon or outside the surface, paints, lacquers, or enamels. With this exclusion in mind, staining is a changing of hue or tone which is due to a chemical reaction or to the application of a liquid that enters to some extent into the interior, and with coloring-matter changes the color of a layer of wood near the surface while still allowing the grain with its different cell arrangements to be seen clearly. Staining should leave a transparent effect instead of obscuring the surface with opaque material such as pigments. The coloring-matter in stains should be in a thoroly-dissolvod condition, instead of being in a turbid muddy paste, when it is applied to the wood.
