RPetry

Scott, Sorry just got in, a long day. It is dark out, but took this picture. By far and away, the Defy stain for hardwoods wins the prize for both color retention and even color. I'll certainly give Defy a test on all of my own ipe' deck next year. As a contractor, still not thrilled with the makeup of waterbase stains, but maybe an old dog can learn new tricks, at least with ipe'. My order will be next year, its everything we can do to wrap up wood work by the Orlando convention. The shoemaker's kids are going barefoot!

At Jake's age, no birthday is happy. Hah! Best wishes for a great day.

Beth, Very impressive and nicely done. Wonder if they know how to actually drink the stuff!

For wood contractors that may not know Mark. He has been in this business, certainly longer than most of us. At one time, Mark had 20+ locations around the country, just servicing exterior wood. Called "oldest woodie in the world" by some, Mark kind of tried to retire, it did not last long. Wood can kind of get into the blood, like that foul game called golf. In conjunction with Jake Clark's new site for wood contractors, Mark has come on board. The content is well worth your time.

Within 75 or 100 years, I think women will be either equal, or dominant in business, politics, and power positions in this country, Western Europe, and possibly other democracies. It makes sense. The trend has been leaning that way for decades, and is accelerating. Give those girls the best education and support possible. You're responsible for the course of civilization!

Geeze, In my day, parents had children reading Latin, quoting Proust, and learning to play piano. Now it's mini-electric guitars, AC-DC, and Wi-Fi. Wish I was born 10 years ago.

Go get 'em gals!. Smart girls and women are the bane of stupid boys and men.

We have been getting some interesting jobs this year. Estimate for an ipe' wrap around porch and sm. cedar deck and pergola on another structure on the property done this past April. Got a call late last week saying "Do it". Ok, but a catch. Please come out and give an estimate on cleaning and staining my cedar siding. See 1st picture. Met with the owner, discussed things, and tried to convince the owner not to touch the cedar siding. The guy is a commercial real estate developer, had to go off to a meeting, so I had only 15 minutes with him. Emphatically told him "No", do not touch this cedar. Its perfect as is. This cedar is from an Amish barn in Pa., estimated to be between 60 and 80 years old. It is very old growth rough sawn cedar and still full of natural tannin. It may have been stained or even painted decades in the past, hard to tell now. No ground contact, and the interior of the home is similar looking wood. See the 2nd pic. Mesquite door, the wood is very old and imported from Mexico. Same wood is used on doors in the interior. Asked me to do a test spot in a out of the way place. See the 3rd pic. Bleach and soap mix, dried with a hair dryer, and RS natural cedar and light brown applied. Came out black, but that is the cedar tannins, and will settle down to true color in a day or two. Comments? My gut tells me to leave this wood as is, a cleaning and staining is not needed or warranted. There is some work that you just want to say NO!

Diamond Jim, Hah! Very good. Another definition just came to mind, but I don't think it would be acceptable to post!

Jon, In theory, your contention makes sense. In the field, working on installed wood is a bit more problematic. When testing moisture, we sink the Delmhorst pins down as far as they will go, ~ 1/4 inch in softwoods. If the wood is 12% or less, it is ready to apply the oil stain. As far as re-bulking and paraffin oil, it does happen, particularly with good, dry, old, cedar. I've seen it. Interesting, but I'll never know, as we don't have a hot water PW! But again, as in the last paragraph, I want the cedar to be bone dry at least a 1/4" in so that the oil can occupy the voids instead of water. One other benefit of non-drying oils, as opposed to drying or film type oils, is that the wood is allowed to "breathe", or in other words, trapped moisture can escape through the surface. Linseed oil may also allow this, but I'm not so sure. Acrylics and latex as far as I know, do not wood to "breathe", allowing trapped moisture to escape. In general, keeping water "trapped" in the wood is not a good thing. Letting it naturally cycle between wet and dry is, again, in general, probably better. Agreed. UV sunlight does the most obvious damage to exterior wood from the perspective of a customer. Stain color slowly fades away, and the wood turns grey. This is cosmetic. What is not so obvious is moisture damage, particularly with newer wood. In temperate climates, moisture can cause real substrate damage, especially with the freeze/thaw cycles during the winter. As you well know, this is what causes checking, cracking, and eventual failure of horizontal wood.

Jon, Piddling is only allowed when you have a urinary problem. Healthy, real woodies pee in the woods! Re-bulking old, dry wood is probably only possible with paraffin oils, ie: Bakers, TWP, or RS. Paraffin oil does not need to be "forced", if the wood is ready to take it, it will suck up a veritable ton of oil.

Beth, That is some accomplishment. Greece or Spain? Wish we had those choices when we were young. To only be young again! Many things in typical life have never been better. The future is looking very good.

Beth, Holy Smokes! You have a 15 yr. old daughter? Good for you and her. Wow, we are getting old. Guess I can't call you my wood minx anymore, how about wood matron? Hah!

Jeff, Ron makes a good point. Keep your own network and keep it local. Firewall your "main computer" or "server" from internet nasties. This can keep garbage from flooding or infecting other internal network computers. "SNAT" your server local hosts. Plenty of storage for photos and videos, with off site backup, is also needed now and especially for the future. After all, You Are The Condo King! Don't let your PM customers know that you have no clue about technology! Your nephew will understand!

Jeff, Who is kidding who? Deck restoration is a niche market that the Condo King would chuckle at!

Scott, That may be true for drying or curing oils, not sure about paraffin oil. The only comparison I can make is with old, thick, rough sawn cedar shakes on a gazebo roof. They were very dry and many, especially on the southern side, were severely cupped. Took a ton of oil, like 50 sq. ft. per gal. of RS. Within a month, the shakes had flattened out. As it was a roof, gravity surely helped, but do not know to what extent. We will do some testing on 3 boards in an unobtrusive area, and possibly wait for next spring to evaluate.

Ken, Yeah, cedar yet again. It is a challenging wood. But for an "oil", the old Tux should have stripped out better than that. Only used straight Tux on one mahogany, one sm. PT, and one ipe' deck, never on cedar. We have used a 2/3rds RS, 1/3 Tux mix on two small mahogany jobs. Did a 2 yr. maintenance this year on both of them, they held up well, bleach cleaned, and reapplied the same mix. Maintenance was a breeze. Have about 5 gals. of Tux left, have to find a use for it!

Daniel, Nice prep on that cedar deck. Those posts are massive. Western red cedar, whether new, old, or in between, can be a pain. But I do not totally subscribe to the statements that newer cedar will not take a fair amount of oil stain. 5 month old, knotty WRC deck done this July. Not of the best quality. This wood took 11 gals. of RS natural cedar. The horizontal wood should be serviced about the same time frame next year, but we got about 1 gal. of oil into the wood per 120 sq. ft.

Ken, There's some great news. Hope S. Lane and his Princeton ipe' rots in *ell! Arggg, wait a minute. We did a large Wood Tux red mahogany deck in Spring of 2008. Its located about 600 yards from my house, can't duck this one. Hmm..., next Spring is booking up!

Western red cedar is the most finicky, challenging wood to deal with. Seems that nearly every job is a bit different.

Jon, Call or email me with your shipping address anytime. That is a dramatic change with the RS light brown. We do not generally do homes, I'm too old for ladders! But I agree that the RS "light" colors, specifically light brown and natural cedar, do cure out to a lighter color within a few days on deck jobs. But I have not experienced such a huge color shift as shown in your pics. Something due to pine logs? I think, what may happen, is the lesser amount of pigment in the lighter RS colors initially lays on top of the wood immediately on application, but slowly gets into the substrate, carried by the paraffin oil, over time. Less pigment on the surface, lighter color. This might be more pronounced in vertical wood, ie: your house example, more so than horizontal wood such as decks, due to simple Newtonian gravity, ie: the pigment lays on the surface longer. But this is mere speculation. I do know that if my customer was expecting pic #3 finish color, and wound up with the much lighter pic #4 color, I'd been in deep trouble as the contractor. This situation is not quite that straightforward. First, this is a new house, just built within the past year. The owner paid a hefty premium for this old growth barn cedar, as far as I know, mostly for the current look of the aged wood. Same with the mesquite. Look at that outside door in one of my pics earlier in this thread. That ancient mesquite is Lord knows, how many years old, and was imported from Mexico. The interior of the house is completed, with this "aged" wood look prevalent throughout. The problem is this. This barn cedar was stored on site in a trailer. From what I can determine, this trailer probably leaked. The carpenters routed each piece to T&G, and vertically sheathed the outside walls with this great looking cedar. Unfortunately, it is my guess that the cedar was not dry, and was installed as wet wood. Check the picture below. This closeup shows the T&G pulled apart due to shrinking and plank warping as the cedar dried out. One other clue is that this shrinkage is most noticeable on the "sunny side" face of the home. The real question and mystery is this. Will "re-moisturizing" this cedar with enough paraffin oil help to "flatten", or at least stop any further shrinkage. Not sure if the oil can "re-swell" the cedar, but am confident it will help slow down or alleviate further shrinkage and warping. The really tough question is what will the wood finish look like? Remember, this guy paid handsomely for this desired "aged" look. Sometimes 9:00 or even 9:30 PM! If old Ben was right, it would be easy getting rich, and everyone would be in bed by sunset!

Daniel, The bottom brown is not bad, and the reddish brown next to it looks ok on mahogany. The other colors are not to my taste. BTW, that mahogany does not look ready for staining.

Daniel, We make no money selling Ready Seal. We do make an acceptable profit staining exterior wood with Ready Seal. Jon, Shoot me an email of your shipping address. 2 gals. of RS med. red will be on its way. My address is in the signature lines. Sorry, its too late and bed time. I'll look over your pics early tomorrow morning.

Diamond Jim, May be splitting hairs, but on new or older cedar that has really cleaned up well, Ready Seal light brown is my favorite!

Scott, That is a terrific color. I'm just wondering if my sample can of A-C is mislabeled. In the following pic, the A-C cedar semi trans is at the bottom right. This is after 2 days of drying on clear cedar. Its yellow, not that rich reddish brown stain color in your picture. BTW, the stain above the A-C is Cabot's Clear Solution Toner, Heartwood color, the eventual stain the customer picked for the cedar. Yuck! Left to right, the other three are RS light, medium, and dark brown.