Thread: Making stuff (Waxes)

I've been making soft wax using the recipe put out by Chris Schwartz using beeswax I get from a mate (I give them big boxes of plane shavings for their compost and to make fire bricks, they give me raw beeswax from their hives). I add in pure carnauba wax (the ratio escapes me at the moment, I have it in a notebook at home) to make hardwax. Been doing this for a couple of years now, it's been incredibly cheap and easy especially compared to commercial products. I know exactly what's going in the stuff, if I'm not happy with the mix I can change it, and I can add any little bits and bobs if I want to experiment. Takes me a couple of hours to make enough wax to last me six to twelve months, have even thought of selling it when I've seen the price of stuff in Bunnings etc.

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D.W. interesting topic. I live in the tropics and don't use much wax as the high humidity and cockroaches make a meal of it. What are your main uses for wax?
The only wax I use these days that stands up is Mother's California Gold Carnauba car polish over Danish Oil. I have been using the same big fat tin for many years now as it seems to go a long way.
Rgds,
Crocy.

Originally Posted by Old Croc

D.W. interesting topic. I live in the tropics and don't use much wax as the high humidity and cockroaches make a meal of it. What are your main uses for wax?
The only wax I use these days that stands up is Mother's California Gold Carnauba car polish over Danish Oil. I have been using the same big fat tin for many years now as it seems to go a long way.
Rgds,
Crocy.

I have that same car wax. I've used it on guitars plenty, just as a surface coat. Less on cars!

I use wax on shellac finish if the shellac is padded, with linseed oil when oiling and waxing something new, on tools..I'm sure I'm forgetting half a dozen other things. I have not made any furniture with a wax only finish, though.

I don't care for a wax finish that is dull looking, thus the desire to use carnauba. Johnson's was dull with a little bit of carnauba. Minwax that's left here is dull looking paraffin wax, and rather than try $100 worth of cans, it seemed easier just to use solvents on hand and buy carnauba.

Minwax is particularly insulting. $17 for a pound can of it and I doubt it has a dollar of materials in it. Johnson's pound can of a better wax was $6 the last time I bought it. the SDS shows that sometime after that, they stopped including carnauba (absolute penny pinching, there wasn't much in it).

I didn't know cockroaches ate wax!! The only threat to supplies here is spiders and house centipedes. Scutigera coleoptrata - Wikipedia

Both are predators, though - not interested in anything I have. I think the house centipedes actually eat the spiders.

So why not use ubeaut wax?

Originally Posted by The Spin Doctor

So why not use ubeaut wax?

I've never seen it on the ground in the US. Anything that comes from a foreign source here is usually heavily marked up by the group with rights to market and distribute it, too. Maybe that will change with the ability to (as ubeaut) ship pallets to amazon and list things themselves.

using briwax as an example:
* Rockler - $34.99
* Woodcraft - $27.99
* Amazon - $21.99 (and you don't have to get off of your duff)

well, plus I've gone around the bend and am pretty much making my own stuff, all the way down to pre-hydrocarbon varnishes. Which has nothing to do with being "anti oil" or anything like that, but more curious about what finishes were like before just about everything was an oil or natural gas byproduct.

Just looked - ubeaut stuff (a small fraction of the offerings) is on amazon here, but it looks like it's coming through penn state industries, which is a mostly hobby/pen turning retailer.

by the price, it looks to be marked up pretty stiffly. For example, $40US for 8 oz of wax with tripoli. I'm not a good customer for something like that as I have the waxes, abrasives and solvents already.

the more interesting things now will be seeing if nanosilica in a hard finish really does anything. Because if it does, it'll be really cheap to make vs. the "carbon method" nonsense pushed by empty hats like the wood whisperer.

Recipe for IQ lowering and high sales:
* cool helpful-seeming vibe
* unique tshirt that seems cool and indie with some statement like "pork pie" and a goofy picture
* sponsored videos that pretend to address a problem that can't be addressed by anything else
* tests comparing items you can draw a commission on with an affiliate link - especially if you get an exclusive agreement that offers a bigger take. Make it look better than something else, talk about how much effort the test was to do.
* gobs of affiliate links, and witless fanboys who are out to tell everyone the business arrangement probably just comes after someone who "really loves woodworking" found something they liked

I've got more of a soft spot for ubeaut since thinking "I wonder if I could experiment with crosslinkers and get a waterproof shellac" and seeing that ubeaut has actually done it. At least the products aren't just rebadged stuff someone else already did.

Back to the carbon method stuff - from what I can tell, it's more or less concrete sealer with a little bit of nanosilica and a significant amount of solvents. What's the virtue of concrete sealer? it makes water bead - it's siloxane and silane finishes, and not particularly expensive. Carbon method doesn't provide an SDS - they probably just get rebadged stuff from china (you can get private label nanosilica "ceramic car system" components for $5 per on aliexpress, just like mvmt could get a bunch of $15 aliexpress type quartz watches with a $3 movement and spend all of their money on add to convince someone the watches were marked down from $250 and now $150, but act fast). But finding another "ceramic" product from a more well known company highlights what's in it...nanosilica, acrylic resin, siloxane and a whole bunch of solvents.

I have some stucco that will be getting a siloxane sealer. I'll find it in the same solvents I want to use to make a finish for the nanosilica.

got a little off track branching out into the idea of making a whole lot more than waxes - what triggered posting this was the legitimate mention, that at least here, you can get micocrystalline wax by the pound cheaply. If you wanted to buy a lot of pounds of it, it would get really cheap.

You can look at SDS from various offerings mail order or hardware store and find suitable solvents to melt it, and if you want to get fancy and make cleaner waxes, you can find all manner of graded abrasives in small amounts without too much looking (the first find is usually usurious in terms of price, but it takes little time to find the same thing elsewhere for a quarter of the cost).

All for what...in my view in the shop, to get away from the idea that someone could stop making a product and you would lose out, and especially, that you have to be sparing with things when they're only seemingly expensive due to not examining options to make vs. buy and creative marketing to put stuff in little bottles for people who make things very infrequently.

I just realized that we have crossed a new threshold.

This post embodies the lyrics of a rolling stones song!

Got any recipes for black paint while we're at it?



I love the discussion, but I need another new hobby like I need a hole in the head. I think the only thing I've used paste wax for in the last 20-something years is fiberglass release agent. Not kidding.

The thing is... None of this is professional use product. Those boutique guys have to make this stuff and package it in itty-bitty shoe polish tins because we use so little. The commercial guys have the benefit that they sell a 5-gallon poly bags of the stuff that comes in plain brown cardboard boxes. Minimum order quantity is a whole pallet. The boutique guys then have to deal with crotchety woodworkers who buy a 1-oz sample then complain all over the internet that it dried out in the tin five years later.

So.. Maybe make some and package it and put it out there for sale. I liken it to Kramers Best. I absolutely love the stuff, but it's next to impossible to find. I don't use tons of it, and it smells good, so I don't care that it costs $16.00 for 6-oz.

Originally Posted by truckjohn

I just realized that we have crossed a new threshold.

This post embodies the lyrics of a rolling stones song!

Got any recipes for black paint while we're at it?



I love the discussion, but I need another new hobby like I need a hole in the head. I think the only thing I've used paste wax for in the last 20-something years is fiberglass release agent. Not kidding.

The thing is... None of this is professional use product. Those boutique guys have to make this stuff and package it in itty-bitty shoe polish tins because we use so little. The commercial guys have the benefit that they sell a 5-gallon poly bags of the stuff that comes in plain brown cardboard boxes. Minimum order quantity is a whole pallet. The boutique guys then have to deal with crotchety woodworkers who buy a 1-oz sample then complain all over the internet that it dried out in the tin five years later.

So.. Maybe make some and package it and put it out there for sale. I liken it to Kramers Best. I absolutely love the stuff, but it's next to impossible to find. I don't use tons of it, and it smells good, so I don't care that it costs $16.00 for 6-oz.

Actually, I don't know who buys wax like johnson's. When I was a kid, we still waxed a few things, but it was more common to polish brass twice a year - all hands on deck. Wax would've been more common 70 years prior to keep furniture fresh.

The renaissance stuff appears to be marketed to conservators. It says it's a "wax blend" which is the same as the hard 1 pound sticks of microcrystalline. Listings have all kind of other words to catch "fishing equipment, hunting knife protective coating".

I probably use more wax than most people, for tool stuff, but also because it's nice in combination with shellac. As in, under shellac when pore filling or turning and then running shellac into it on handles or tools. I guess that leads to some waste.

What's a lot? A pound every couple of years on top of some low level consumption of beeswax and mineral oil (a quart per 8 years or something for that?).

I'll admit to early on using wax with oil cleaning up wooden planes or making new ones, or waxing furniture that was padded lightly with shellac - and being very sparing with it. At this point, I know that was foolish, but it was pre-hobby habit, the same as going out of my way to go turn off a 9 watt light that's turned on again in half an hour.

I use shop-made paste wax on lots of things - as the final finish on items needing some measure of protection from water, to protect tools from rust (although in those super humid months it proved not up to the task), as a lubricant for planing, sawing etc (usually I have paraffin on hand but paste wax also serves well).

My basic (rough) recipe is to mix 100g of beeswax with 50mL of boiled linseed oil and 20-25 mL of gum turpentine and combine in a bowl and carefully heat on double boiler. I get all of these products from a local arts supplier/wholesaler and are all natural products (not because I am against modern synthetic solvents as my chemistry degree attests but because I like working with them in my small garage shop).

I want to add carnauba wax to this basic mix for additional protection. But I will have to do two things - more heat (carnauba melts at 85 degrees) and more gum turpentine (to dissolve carnauba). I will let you know how I fare.

All good info so far, but what has got me interested is D.W. mentioning carbon method again. I usually use tea oil on my cast iron surfaces, but I have an Italian planer/ thicknesser with steel tables and nothing stops them going rusty.I use this Corrosion X, aircraft grade on all my hand tools and it's absolutely the best stuff. Thinking of trying it on the planer now.
It's a US product, but available from SKF and similar shops, no idea whats in it, but it works for me.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...Do8L9xKF3rWccB
Rgds,
Crocy.

Originally Posted by Old Croc

All good info so far, but what has got me interested is D.W. mentioning carbon method again. I usually use tea oil on my cast iron surfaces, but I have an Italian planer/ thicknesser with steel tables and nothing stops them going rusty.I use this Corrosion X, aircraft grade on all my hand tools and it's absolutely the best stuff. Thinking of trying it on the planer now.
It's a US product, but available from SKF and similar shops, no idea whats in it, but it works for me.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...Do8L9xKF3rWccB
Rgds,
Crocy.

whatever else may be in it beyond the solvent isn't described, so it must be nontoxic. It could be an acid or something that reacts until it is spent.

the SDS says that it is >90% heavy hydrotreated distillate. Hydrotreated oil is like food quality stuff - no color or odory stuff in it or anything unstable, so that 90% is likely doing a whole lot of work. Hydrotreated oil won't dry, either, so when you put it on something, it will stay there until you wipe it off.

hydrotreated gear oil can be bought on the upper end of things if a similar oil is desirable but even heavier - it wouldn't have whatever other secret is the other small % of corrosion X, though, if that's anything other than water. it must be. There is at least some colorant in the stuff.

When I switched to oilstones, I put hydrotreated mineral oil in my norton trihone because it costs a lot less than norton honing oil (which turns out to be exactly the same thing). Tools that previously rusted when using waterstones and then wiping with camellia oil (probably not thorough enough when it was an extra step) no longer rust, but with just a very light coating of mineral oil, if you literally pour water on the tools or leave them under a drip (once in a great while, i've done that) they will rust a little.

i thought maybe there would be a tiny amount of silane in what you provided (concrete and masonry sealer, also shows up in the nosebleed price tiny bottles of "ceramic" car finish), but I don't see it and I think it would have to be listed if it was in there.

I've used a very light cut of blonde shellac (like very light) on anything that could go years without being looked at and have never had any of that rust at all. With the surface that's on cast (the milling and grinding marks), i think what happens with something like shellac or the whiz bang expensive stuff is it doesn't wear out of the troughs very quickly * as long as it's applied thin enough to get into them *.

it takes a lot of effort to actually wipe all of the hydrotreated mineral oil off of a tool, thus I end up with edge pictures like this:

https://i.imgur.com/I3miSbE.jpg

The little dots and the vertical lines are all oil. left after wiping the tool a couple of times. If there is any oil at all or any part of a rag that has wiped even a little bit on something goes over the surface, the oil isn't gone. I have to wipe a tool off five times with clean cloth sections to get the oil to stop showing up and this is light​ mineral oil.

My microcrystalline wax arrived yesterday. I probably won't get to make a purpose-made wax with it for use out of a can, but it strikes me as I always use gulf wax for planing (I've gone through two pounds of that over the years - it's $4 here for a pound. Rob Cosman warns his students that it's "unpredictable". I think it's predictable - if they buy it, they won't buy wax from him).

Gulf is a canning wax, inexpensive and low melting temperature.

it will be interesting to see if the higher melting point microcrystalline wax blend results in any improvement when used on planes "dry".

when I was testing iron edge life with a LN bronze 4 (a plane that makes a lot of friction), the planing was continuous and I waxed often, but there was still warmth. The bar of gulf wax would actually melt most of the way onto the sole in a very light film with one pull across. Talk about lazy. if you waited a fraction of a minute, the sole would cool enough for the wax to haze.

I have to correct my terminology. Renaissance uses a "wax blend". presumably to cut the cost of using all microcrystalline wax.

I mentioned that I bought a "wax blend". I didn't. i bought pure microcrystalline wax, and the seller's business name is "blended wax, Inc".

the shipped price from amazon is <10 a pound if you buy two pounds. I'm running low on gulf wax, so this will serve double duty. a pound bar is a little less expensive than cosman's small glue stick sized container of "plane wax" or whatever it is. If you asked him what it is, he is an honest guy and will probably just tell you what it is. I already gave him grief about saying that you shouldn't buy canning paraffin wax, so I won't bug him again. Of all of the gurus out there, I don't always agree with what he says opinion wise, but I have challenged paul sellers' advice when it's bad- your comment gets deleted. Rob literally always answers politely, and whether that's just a business strategy or not, at least he answers.

Anyway, I'm not using a "wax blend". Blended waxes are cheaper, but the seller I bought from sells blended waxes for candle making - $4 a pound.

microcrystalline waxes are available at least in 130F to 195F melting range. The latter is very very high, a little above carnauba, and would take some elbow grease to get on furniture. No clue if it would shine like carnauba - carnauba itself in pure grade for food or soaps isn't expensive enough to consider trying something else. We already know if you put the trouble in to buff carnauba, it's a gloss.