Refinishing Warning

[Farrell]

I have a rosewood square grand to refinish and have been considering subbing
it out. Got a few estimates. Gave one guy the music desk to refinish so that
he could provide me with an example of his work.

My general experience with the quality of refinishers has largely been
whether they rub out the final finish or not, and how well they remove any
orange peel, etc.

I picked up the music desk at this shop yesterday. Looking at it in his shop
it looked nice. Not rubbed out, but a nice smooth satin finish. Something
looked a bit funny about it, but I told him it looked good.

Got back to my shop and compared it to a piece of rosewood I had applied
some tung-oil-based varnish to. OhmyGod. What a difference. His piece was
milky - it looked like it was finished with 2% fat milk rather than varnish
or laquer. Horrible, horrible, horrible. You could see the rosewood grain,
but it was translucent rather than transparent. I had never seen anything
like it. They guy would not disclose his product used or his methods. I
would kind of like to know - just so I avoid ever wasting my time with it.

FWIW - make sure you see (and preferably can keep) a sample of your
refinisher's work.

Looks like time for another wrestling match with refinishing!

Terry Farrell