Refinishing Warning

[Howard F Jackson]

Terry,
It sounds like the lacquer dried too fast and trapped moisture inside.  A
little retarder would probably solve this, however if the finisher sent
this back to you as a sample of his work, I believe I'd look elsewhere.
 Howard Jackson

On Thu, 24 Jan 2002 09:31:37 -0500 "Farrell" <mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com>
writes:
> 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
> 
> 
> 


Howard Jackson, RPT
Registered Piano Technician, Piano Technicians Guild
Monroe, LA   (318) 388-4879
e-mail: Hjackson8@juno.com