Featured Cool Old Rocking Chair I am working on Restoring

I didn't want to dispraise the work or counsel of anybody here. just stumbled upon him haphazardly during research.

 

I keep paint original if it is original. I love old painted surfaces and have several old chests and a couple Windsors with original paint and would never strip them. But if the paint is not original (and the original paint is not lurking underneath), or if it has already been stripped, I would leave the wood surface and not repaint myself. (Cluttered's chair does look like old varnish to me as well, in which case varnish could be the original finish - by the end of 19th century not much factory furniture was being painted anymore).

 

My thoughts exactly. The chair looks as if it was varnished, never painted.
I am not one for the current painting fashion, I am always for bringing antique furniture back to the original state as much as possible. Bearing in mind it has had a life. Besides, the wood on DeAnne's chair has such a beautiful grain, just like the chair cluttered posted.

 

Yeah, i hear what you guys are saying however, i ain't buying it.lol
It could very well be a varnish finish but, if it is i would argue that the varnish was colored with a pigment. Varnish by itself has little or no color, is transparent & has no added pigment.

 

So i have been researching this finish question the past several days as i find it interesting plus, it's the dog days of summer here in the carolinas & i am hiding from the heat/humidity & waiting on fall!
First thing i notice is, one needs a degree in chemical engineering when reading about this as the language is confusing & finishing wood gets very complicated in a hurry. I even got out Bob Flexner's book (finishing guru who forced antique roadshow to retract their "experts" propaganda on the grunge movement), it didn't help much either.
In any event, no definitive info yet but a couple general points so far
1. Varnish in it's natural state is clear, oil varnish will yellow over time, water varnish (poly) will not yellow but isn't applicable because not around in 1890.
2. It can be tinted or colored, oil stain can be added in any color to tint/color the oil based varnish.
3. I do not think it possible for @clutteredcloset49 (as an example) chair to have a clear varnish finish and "gone off" to that dark a state all by itself unless something really weird happened. (like in a fire)
4. If you look at OP pics 3 & 4 in first post (restoration pics) you can clearly see color in the less dense "earlywood" and virtually no color on the much more dense "latewood". This is a common problem when staining oak, especially plain sawn oak, where open pores of earlywood soak up stain and the latewood takes almost none.

 

Okay maybe this will clear up any confusion on why the chair was like it was when i found it. The guy was 90 and hadn't even lived in the house in over 20 years. Scroll all the way down on the link to pictures of inside the house especially the living room it will blow your mind. It was pretty bad not smelly just wow


https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...?key=RUtXVUxXblFQN0ZvRjRZdGpHRjNPNS1tMGwtcS13

 

Or here if you don't feel like scrolling

 

OH AN SOMEONE ACTUALLY BOUGHT THAT COUCH

 

@DeAnne
Wow someone who is worse than me

What else did you get?
That box of Roseville looked good.
So did the Pyrex

 

Speechless!

 

Oh dear, I have stumbled in a den of hoarders!
Still, that does not change that DeAnne chair now down to bare wood, that chair had stain/color added in some way, ditto @clutteredcloset49 chair.
If you do this restoration "right" that @DeAnne chair is going to be worth a pretty penny, even after taking into account 1stdibs is overpriced.

 

Just a display case The rest was so yucky I really didn't want to touch it LOL. But I am glad someone did buy that couch it is where I found the top to the case. The bottom was outside on the porch and I was looking for the top I saw them move that couch and there is was

 

All I did was used hot soapy water to clean it with a wash cloth and scrubby pad

 

LOL, oh lord, hoarders INC. over here!

 

And this is what I did with the display case

 

And, I'd say it's coming along very well, so far.

 

Oh and I bought those wood things for grand babies to play with

 

Hi,
Sometimes not hoarders. In the 1960s I was hiking down some abandoned railroad tracks and came upon a house which was empty since the late 1930s. I climbed through a smashed window. Who ever lived there fled one night and everything was untouched since then. I came back with a wagon and loaded it up with 75 pieces of depression glass, dozens of canning jars etc. I made plans to return the following weekend since I had to go to work. The furniture was all black horse hair covering.
I never made it into the basement. On Sat when I returned a bull dozer was smashing the house into pieces. I always wondered if German spies were living there. I tried to check on the city records for the address but it just said that taxes were not paid since July 1938. The records did not contain any names just the lot an block number of the property.
greg

 

It's a good thing you at least got the glassware out. There are some abandoned house videos on Youtube about places no one has lived in ages. Some are here in the US and some in Europe.