I have wooden storm and front doors on my 1925 Chicago brick bungalow home, stained and varnished 90 years ago. Looks as though nothing has been done since. I want to strip them down to bare wood, plug some opened seams and refinish. Numerous questions occur, including:
Stripping the doors: By hand or send them out to be dipped. If by hand, what stripper to you suggest? I have lots of experience with the nasty stuff that burns skin like crazy.
Damage filler: Some gaps exist where seams have opened. What to use to fill the openings that will accept stain?
Finish. I am thinking stain and cover with several coats of polyurethane. How to prepare the surface after stripping? Is poly the right choice for weather resistance? How many coats of poly for exterior protection?
Period appropriate hardware: Any suggestions for sources of door knobs, locksets and key plates?
Any thoughts? Thanks much for your consideration.
Replies
Norman
I have had teh pleasure of making some pretty old, bogus looking doors come back to life. What you do to get them there is a bit of luck thrown in with measures that work.
Dipping sometimes is the right way, othertimes not. If the finish is pretty much wore off, sanding and some liquid strippers might be easy. You can control where the product goes doing it by hand. A good dip stripper you can rely on will perhaps be the answer. Once it's all dissolved it can be cleaned out of all the nooks and crannies and joints. Some will just dip and dry-you'll end up picking away at all the gunk left in the joints b/4 you attempt to pull them together.
If your joints have separated I would first try this. Clean out all (or most) of the crud, previous filler attempts, finish and/or glue from the gaps. Using pipe clamps slightly, see if you can move the parts. If so, I apply Titebond III to them and really torque down on the clamps. You'll need to clean out the ends of the joints also-dirt etc gets lodged in there. You should inject glue up in there when ready to pull together.
The same goes for splits in panels. If you can glue and pull them together, all the better.
Filler? Most "plastic" woods cannot acheive the same color when stained that your original door wood can. It's the nature of the beast. If you are good at coloring, whether with stains, dyes, natural stains, paint colorants, etc................ , you could use them and then touch up the different wood filler color. Then apply your finish.
Or, if only slight cracks/splits, I've had good luck with the soft fills in a small jar. They go on soft, wipe off and can be mixed amonst each other to attain the proper color. They do harden somewhat but shouldn't be used for wide cracks. Check them out well, some cannot be covered by..........I forget-think it's waterbourne finishes. So if covering with oil or urethanes, should work.
For finishes that protect from direct sun, the spar "varnishes" are the only thing that'll hold up. If shaded and protected you could get away with other exterior clear coatings. Most spar's (varnish or urethanes) will amber the final result a bit.
REMEMBER, seal the tops and bottoms.
Hardware. I have no problem getting new expensive hardware from a local distributor. He can get darn near any of the natl brands as well as some odd small shop stuff. Most like Baldwin, Acorn.............otheres, will have period hardware available.
or I go into my stach of salvage, it's why you hang onto that stuff isn't it.
Best of luck.