Thread: Advice on Japanning

Here's another thought. Were these old sewing machines japanned? Notice the golden ornaments? Could something similar be done when refurbishing old planes and other tools? Gold dust?

(I took this picture at an antique store this afternoon)

20230511_140743.jpg

Yes, at least some of them were. I'll try to locate where I read it and see if it was cold or hot japanning.

They were baked japanning. It's possible that the top coat is clear as some of the literature talks about a ground, color coats and then a clear topcoat.

If you can do it on a sewing machine casting (the gold), you can do it on a plane body. There has to be a restoration site or forum somewhere with discussion of the gold decoration.

It's a remarkable finish, no running, no brush marks, smooth surfaces.

Here's another possible example, sitting next to the sewing machine, an old typewriter.

20230511_140750.jpg20230511_140757.jpg

Gold leaf decals on singer machines. Apparently there were some originals left that have been used in recent restorations.

The japanning is brushed or dipped, and the gold leaf solves the question about why the topcoat wouldn't cause it to run. It does level divinely, which is why I want to run resin and get rid of the few stray grits of asphaltum. If those are a contaminant, they'll sink to the bottom of the pot when run.

Was there a clear top coat on these machines? That could complicate matters.

I was thinking that a decal or fine brush with gold paint would fuse with the last coat of japanning.

Probably. The books specify baking a top coat as the last coat. I guess that would be a clear copal varnish or something. Not sure what would end up at the right hardness.

I'm going to try dissolving the ingredients at room temperature and by heating to see how the finished product looks like.

Some of the current online advise don't indicate 450f baking temperature, but some multiple stage baking process. It may be over complicating the process, we'll have to see.

So far in limited (comparing A vs. B - thicker or thinner coats), the outcome and look of the thinner coats (and the hardness) is better.

I would say lay it on thin, let whatever you put it on cook for 2 hours and then do it again.

The only complaint I have is the tiny dots that can be seen undissolved, but after reading about asphaltum, it's possible (not sure) that those may be undissolvable grit.

I've proved and probably plenty of others have if one doesn't are about them, the "easy method" is super easy, and still visually vastly superior to the method that Stephen Shepherd errantly proposed. In looking for cold japanning information, google sent me back to Derek's article that he quoted from - it should probably be revised because the results aren't very good from the pictures - the asphaltum doesn't necessarily "dissolve" in the new varnish and link with anything and it looks gritty in the pictures, but the pictures aren't good enough to tell).

At some point, information gets stale or incorrect enough that it should be revised or just removed for the good of others.

Back to running it vs. not running it (for the benefit of those not into varnish, running again being the process of heating past melting point and both cooking out any volatiles - there's not much in asphaltum by percent, though) - and also allowing the grit to settle and then be strained out later or just settled and left in the pan. If there is silica-like grit, it will settle due to density.

To run it isn't necessary for durability from what I can tell - the sample spokeshave is divine, and the feel is unbelievably authentic.

It'd be lovely to find out exactly what stanley did, but how Stephen supposed that they mixed asphaltum with other varnish and did a cold process is weird.

One or two varnish texts that I've seen state that asphaltum should be run as all resins should be run - if you're looking at a singer machine and admiring the smoothness, that's definitely true, I guess. Too, in reading more about multi-step processes (for fine work, like japanese pottery or metalwork or whatever), the build is more coats than tools on the expectation that the work will be polished. In that context, running and getting the cleanest thing possible makes sense.

The either or with tools here is that it doesn't have to be that difficult (running resins can be dangerous - it doesn't have to be, but it absolutely must be done outside), and my suppositions about the offgassing while baking asphaltum were not the case - you smell the oil and the turps a little - I wouldn't do it in a bedroom, but I'd actually do it in the kitchen oven with a fan - as mentioned, without issue - as long as it's asphaltum and not petroleum bitumen.

I'm kind of stoked about running a pound of the resin and seeing what it's like after that. It'll be thinner than paper but look as deep as a sheet of smoked glass.

I'll bet when the older stanley planes were brand new with bright metal and fresh japanning, they probably looked like they had black clear water on the plane beds and would make the current painted boutique planes look a little gross.

The trade off with japanning is that it's tough, but as soon as you have a gritty finger and handle it, you will never hurt the finish itself, but the surface can be dulled.

That could actually be prevented to some extent for the showy by letting the japanning fully cure (or baking it overnight and then letting it go for another couple of days) and brushing a very thin coat of shellac on top of it. That kind of thing is out of my wheelhouse, though.

I tried to find more explanation on the top coat in holtzapffel, but the discussion seems to be toward stuff that's more finely finished than sewing machines or plane bodies.

Gilsonite's literature provides a more tight range for melting temp, and I don't have it at hand, but I think the upper part of the range was about 360F. 400F for baking just isn't enough clear of that.

450 does not result in any running. The texts do confirm that if you continue to go higher, you can have bubbling or melting/running (and probably smoke).

Much of the old recipe information uses naptha instead of turpentine, and some recipes will replace turpentine and oil in general with naptha and pitch. I would hate to resort to that and deal with the offgassing/smoke/stink. But it was probably cheaper.

There is a whole world of evaporative, varnish and dipping finishes (as in, generating a reaction on metals to get a brilliant color) that would probably be interesting if someone would go to the effort of showing how to do it properly.

Holtzapffel makes the plain statement that proper japanning is always baked.

I have trouble believing that some curator or university professor somewhere doesn't know exactly how stanley japanned planes. I wouldn't be surprised to find that they used a recipe like I used, but with the resin run and filtered - not such a big deal when doing a lot at a time vs. thinking about doing one or two planes - and then baked overnight, as Holtzapffel's comment about curing imply that baking overnight is preferable on work where the surface finish is important (to make sure the varnish is as hard as it can be).

Such an interesting topic - one that's easily accessible and just turned in waste of time directions from various gurus. I'm not angry that people didn't find a better answer, or just stuffed off with Stephen's kind of free wheeling writings without being able to say "I really don't know" - that creates the consensus snowball. The information isn't really any good, but there's consensus for it and a QED is placed at the end. What I'm angry about is that I refinished large numbers of planes in the past, always hated the fact that even good paint can be scratched to the casting fairly easily (and the good high solid paint isn't particularly cheap), and that the bad information persisted for so long for us in isolation leading to a bunch of wanted cold finishes that aren't any easier (probably less easy) and don't look nearly as good.

And then you migrate around to something like a sewing forum, and there are people japanning sewing machines and laying gold leaf decals within the coats.

This hobby has always suffered from wanting to be cigars and donuts, and then fact that the outcome is ultimately inconsiderate if the amateurs don't get out of the way and insist on getting information that's from professional experience. like "have you done this for customers".

We have Warren, but information doesn't flow like a faucet, and we have George, but George is uninterested because he knows the conversion rate (good information is taken, learned and spread as good information vs. just ignored after the entertainment value of hearing about it is gone).

Google Books

Page 1404 starts the relatively short section on japanning. We are doing what is referred to as "brown" work but without adding umber (which interestingly has a drying effect in some pigments).

The text more or less says quickly to use as high of a temp as possible short of one that will cause problems. Again, not surprising as it will improve the length of the polymer chains (make the japanning harder ...thanks Bill T...by curing with heat rather than UV or oxides).

And my supposition earlier that cleaning doesn't need to be nutty kind of 10 stage until everything is gone and then blow dry - rather cleaning with turpentine or linseed oil would be fine if they're in the japanning to be used.

My toaster oven stops at 450, and after that is undefined toast and broil, which could get ugly, so 450 is it for me. The thermocouple says that the toaster oven is within 10 degrees of indicated, which is pretty spectacular given that it was $21 including shipping - cheapest i could find. It's underpowered (half of the wattage that it claims), which just means it takes longer to get to temp - accuracy is more important for this and tempering, though - which is what it gets used for.

I'm continuing to read other explanations about japanning, and stanley is intertwined.

There are some obvious indicators that folks using cold brush on off the shelf approximations (like rio grande's apshaltum varnish) are using a spirit varnish, vs a true varnish.

And a lot of suppositions about how stanley may have japanned tools and then let them sit for months.

There's a big urge on all discussions of this kind of thing to explain without knowing. It's really bizarre.

The only question i'd have at this point with stanley's japanning is if they found a cheaper way to get a good baking varnish than gilsonite, linseed oil and turpentine. As in, did they get cheap and mix more pitch in to release linseed oil and use it with naptha or something.

Without attempting that stinky setup, it's hard to know if there is a compromise.

One of the other sites talking about this described the japanning as being "closely held trade secrets with ingredients like litharge, burnt umber, etc".

Those are just varnish driers and would be used to clean up the effort. Burnt umber is actually used as a drying agent in varnish - none of that is trade secret, it's just versions of one of the japanning methods already long published (all the way back to the 1600s or 1700s in English texts, and probably before that).

I doubt there is a better of more convenient japanning than a run version that I put together, but even the old texts around 1900 talk about penny pinching, and I'm sure if it didn't make much of a difference, stanley could probably do it.

Boggling also is the number of discussions that refer to anything attempted as "stanley varnish" because someone has blogged or written in the last 25 years about something they put on a stanley plane.

Wild, and a great illustration of why there should be two levels of woodworking information - of course we can't split the discussions up and when they do go in depth and accurate, it's too much for beginners. And others who attempt to be string pullers complaining that needling away for the right or closest to right answer gets in the way of talking about making dovetails and buying fretsaws.

I have nothing to add except to say that I enjoy reading your deep dive into japanning, DW. Keep it coming!

Originally Posted by johknee

I have nothing to add except to say that I enjoy reading your deep dive into japanning, DW. Keep it coming!

Thanks, John - something will come of it in the end! in between, a lot of the details are more or less a data stream in getting there.

I think the mix as it is is just dandy, and the further chasing of perfection is more out or curiosity - this was a finish for fine castings and high quality work in the past and the non-critical inside of stanley's castings wasn't done to the level that more needs to be done vs. the simple mix I mentioned (the tiny dots, etc, not a real problem - and the initial result might stand up to knocking them off, anyway).

Point being, the "running" of this stuff by cooking it and then ladling off or filtering the heated resin or resin/oil or even resin/oil turps full varnish in the hot pan (think cooking at 500F for quite some time separately, and then however hot it needs to be to fuse with oil so that you can pull your fingers apart and the finish makes sticky strings - the sign that it has become a true varnish and will remain stable in the jar and not separate....

....all of that stuff that's more messy is to see not only if really wonderfully glassy japanning can be done on tools, but also because the process can suddenly be done more just for filthy-hand intended tools. It can be done on metals and hardware that's intended to go outside, and have a paper thick layer (or thinner) and look like it has glass-like depth.

Raffo and I were discussing this elsewhere, and I'm also getting a pound of gilsonite shortly. If it's the same a decade apart in purchase, you can potentially feel like spending the cake to get a pound to australia will be worthwhile. Why? Because I was loafing through the american gilsonite (the company that mines, prepares and distributes the stuff) webpage and they separate the resin by grades based on temperature performance. that means that we will be getting screened powder in a temperature grade and not at random, and that should eliminate the chance that someone would get a softer resin (probably directed to pavement additive) or one that is so hard that a toaster oven at 450F won't get it to lay out and fuse.

The melting range for the chunks right out of the ground is pretty wide, but the powder is always quoted with a very practical range and narrow temp range for us - it seems like we can all have success. If I don't forget, I will post a shorter version of just what I've done so far (heating the mix last night actually got all of the asphaltum in suspension - I was hoping to screen what I have, but it's now actually much thicker - still lays out nicely).....and then i'll post a version of a run version that gets screened - it essentially after it's run could be baked, or a small amount could be divided off to a small jar and mixed with metallic driers and brushed like varnish, and hopefully be very clear and smooth like glass or the best lacquers, but with far better practical toughness and adhesion.

It's clear that the heat in the toaster oven does the job as a hard press of the fingers on tool #2 does not leave a fingerprint even the next day. it's wonderful to experiment with because success doesn't seem iffy or unpredictable. And the feel is so authentic with only an overnight wait - it's unreal and anything we japan tool-wise will certainly outlive us.