Wood Conditioner Video

Wood Conditioner - Use One Before Staining Wood

Some woods, like oak, are easy to stain. The wood cells are very closed and the stain is not soaked into the wood. A soft wood, such as white pine is very porous and will soak up too much of the stain and the grain of the wood will not show through. You need to close up the wood pores in a soft wood which is what a wood conditioner does. The pre-stain conditioner will close the wood pores. These conditioners are similar to thinned down varnishes or urethanes. They have resins in them that partially fill some of the pores in the soft woods so only a small amount of stain is absorbed by the wood.

They go on clear and only takes 15 minutes to dry.

After the wood conditioner is dry, go ahead and stain the wood. The wood stain will not soak in too much in soft woods. The wood grain will show through the stain beautifully. If you did not use the conditioner, the wood stain would be very dark and there would be little or no wood grain showing. The pre-stain wood conditioners are a must on soft woods.

Do a Test First

It's BEST to do a test on some scraps of wood before you actually stain your wood. Do exactly what you see me do in the video so you get a feel of how the wood conditioner protects your wood from absorbing too much dark stain.

Marie from Oak Harbor, WA, emailed asking about mixing stains. Read her story in the March 23, 2011 Newsletter. This was the I didn't Know That!! article in the October 22, 2013 Newsletter.