Thread: Lacquer

Originally Posted by Kev Y.

I have just purchased a 4lt tin of STYLWOOD 70% and the thinners for it from the local PAINTRIGHT store, they do not have it on the shelf as it is not a generally sought after product.


Kev

Thanks for that, no doubt I should be able to get it in as a "special order" - pity that they only have it in 4L - at that price I wouldn't want to waste any.
http://www.attiwillsonline.com.au/18...5%25-4L/pd.php

Gary, Like you I spent a long time searching for lacquers and specifically Nitrocellulous (Nitro). Being a guitar maker, Nitro is the traditional and sought after finish. Here are a few things I learned along the way and some of this is already said above so I wont elaborate.

Theoretically you can use something other than a spray gun to apply bulk (i.e. not in rattle can) lacquer but I wouldn't go there.

Plain old nitro is almost impossible to find in Oz! Only place I found that sells it is Durobond in Sydney (http://www.durobond.com.au/lacquers.htm). They call it Guitar Lacquer and have some solid colours (black and white I think) and clear and sealers and thinners that all work together and unless you live there you pay for special road shipping interstate so it gets expensive - around $80 for 4 lit but I haven't bought any in a while.

I use Protec's Catalac mostly and if it is for furniture this is good. I use it because Protec have 2 outlets in Brisbane so it is easy to get. (I should add that they were threatening to discontinue it because they are more into automotive and industrial coatings.) It is a pre-catalysed lacquer meaning is contains a catalyst that sets it off and hardens it (like a 2-pack but is only a single pack). IT WILL NOT RE-FLOW WITH SUBSEQUENT COATS LIKE NITRO WILL so you need to get all your coats on while they are still curing to get good adhesion or you have to scuff sand.

Mirotone's MIROLAC is pretty much the same thing, a pre-catalysed lacquer. But they make it harder to buy if you're not a production house with big volumes so I haven't used it. I'm fairly sure I have seen it in rattle cans too but can't recall - where maybe a specialist paint shop like Paint Place in Milton Brisbane.

Only use the recommended thinners with any of these products. I made the mistake of using acrylic lacquer thinners with catalac and adhesion between layers was very poor and required removal and re-finish.

You can buy acrylic lacquer in rattle cans from some places including some automotive re-finish suppliers. The brand that I have found has a wide range of colours and types is ANCHOR (look here for example http://www.campbellswholesale.com.au/Anchorbond-Paint). Also SuperCheap sell Septone acrylic lacquers and fillers and primers in rattle cans. I'm not sure that acrylic lacquers will re-flow like nitro.

I usually grain fill wood with TimberMate or clear epoxy and seal with shellac before applying lacquer. I find that the Colourtone tints sold by StewMac (www.stewmac.com) work in any sort of lacquer or shellac to give you a transparent coloured finish.

My current mission is to find water-based lacquer (like this: http://www.targetcoatings.com/produc...n-lacquer.html) here in Oz - I'll be posting separately about that.

Good luck

Andrew

Originally Posted by Asquared

Gary, Like you I spent a long time searching for lacquers and specifically Nitrocellulous (Nitro)....

Andrew

Andrew - thanks so much for all that info it is very useful and very much appreciated. Good luck with the water based lacquer - if I stumble across it I'll be sure to inform you. Cheers.
Gary


BTW Anybody, I could swear I had seen some Deft products somewhere in Oz - was I dreaming?

"Lacquer" and "varnish" are pretty vague terms and their meaning changes over time, but the meaning which I think is most relevant now is that lacquer is a finish that hardens by solvent evaporation, rather then by chemical reaction. This has many implications for the user, too many to go through here but Wikipedia helps.

Most lacquers in the past were nitrocellulose. Pure NC lacquers are now pretty rare - mostly they have been replaced by their mutated offspring 'precat lacquers'. These are still NC, but sufficiently modified so that there is a minor chemical reaction (crosslinking) on drying. This makes them tougher and more stable - in fact they are very very tough.

You wont ever see NC or Precat lacquers for sale in Bunnings because they are not DIY level products. Bunnings et al (wisely) wont sell products that DIY users cant use or understand because they are more hassle then they are worth in terms of people bringing them back and complaining and unfairly giving the company a bad name. They will sell the lacquer thinners because they have many other uses besides just thinning lacquer (a task that the ones sold in Bunning don't actually do very well).

The main reason they are not DIY is because you cant brush lacquer. You can spray it, but there is a learning curve and (without instruction) I have found it takes about a year of infrequent use to be a good lacquer sprayer. By good, I mean able to lay down a mirror finish straight off the gun.

I think you also need a good compressor, filters and guns. Its hard to imagine you can really get a good setup for under $1000.

I should point out that there are brushing lacquers available in the US, not seen them here though. Also not sure if they are genuine NC, or just stolen the name.

The real market for Precat lacquers is small time furniture manufacturers. People that need the profit-enabling advantages of spray finish but aren't big enough to have the time and money to set up for 2k (2 pack polyurethane), which is very toxic and needs special equipment and modification to premesis.

Most lacquers are available through professional finish outlets. I use Wattyl Stylewood, which I buy from Wattyl Industrial outlets - of which there is one in Sydney at Lidcombe (or maybe its Regents Park). Interestingly, when I went to a retail Wattyl outlet in Parramatta they didn't seem to know what Stylwood was.

Buying lacquers like Stylwood can seem very expensive, especially when you realise how much disappears as overspray, but don't forget most buyers are business owners who have gone to the trouble of setting up trade accounts and are buying at 60% of the cost of retail, or even less. I think Wattyl Industrial almost never sells to retail customers at retail price.

The main thing I find about precat lacquers is that you also need to use an NC sealer. I often read advice to people to spray NC lacquer direct onto timber, and I shake my head with dismay because you are going to get nothing but a thick gluggy finish which looks like plastic and will be hard to sand and work with. A sealer basically sits below the surface and prepares the timber so that you can achieve a perfect finish with minimal coats of lacquer - so you get a thin hard dense finish, not like plasticy poly. Also, sealers are designed to be sanded, so they sand like a dream - with little effort and don't clog the sandpaper. Precat lacquers are designed to be tough and resist abrasion, so they are pigs to sand. You need to use both. Why cant people understand that ?

On the positive side, once you have gone down the learning curve, lacquers are a wonderful finish. The main thing I like about them is that when you are done you are done! Its not like WOP or shellac (which I pursued for many years before switching to lacquers) where you never seem to be quite finished (there is always something about the finish that can be improved). I can go from bare timber to mirror finish in 4 or 5 coats, which takes about 3 hours in elapsed time but really only about 15 minutes in spray time, and once the gun is hung up then you know you are done. I also like that the finish is just about bullet proof. And of course, the big advantage -> because lacquer dries almost as soon as it hits the timber, if you have tolerant neighbours you can spray outside. You cant do that with poly based products because they dry slowly and so attract every piece of dust or insect in the neighbourhood.

I'm not sure about them not yellowing though - I haven't found that to be true.

I hope that puts the product in perspective.
cheers
Arron

Originally Posted by Asquared

My current mission is to find water-based lacquer (like this: http://www.targetcoatings.com/produc...n-lacquer.html) here in Oz - I'll be posting separately about that.

Good luck

Andrew

That's my mission too. Please, please keep us informed on progress. I promise to do likewise.
cheers
Arron

Why didn't I try here in the first place - I knew of them!

http://www.globak.com.au/SPECIALTY-P...egorylist.aspx

Whilst the shipping makes it expensive I *think* I might be able to convince Home Hardware to get me some in as they have extended their range of MinWax products extensively in recent times (due to their connection with US giant Lowes).

This product is a mixture of Nitrocellulose and Coconut Alkyd, presumably the Alkyd helps with the brushing.

I cant help thinking that the main use of that product would be for repairs to jobs already lacquered - where its not worthwhile getting your spray gear out and dirty. I've tried doing that by brushing on Stylwood when I want to lay down a couple of quick base coats before spraying a final coat at a later time.

As it is its difficult to think of any advantage it would have over poly - in fact I reckon you probably couldnt tell it from poly in most cases.

Water base poly is about the clearest thing I have seen up there with a thinner base lacquer but much cheaper and easier to apply. Not as hard a finish but again, what is it being used on?

Globak are a forum sponsor.
Click on their banner in the right hand column or the one below or the one at the top of the Finishing Forum and it will take you directly to their site.

Originally Posted by Claw Hama

Water base poly is about the clearest thing I have seen up there with a thinner base lacquer but much cheaper and easier to apply. Not as hard a finish but again, what is it being used on?

Oh you would use it anywhere you want a clear protective finish - poly and (other) varnishes can of course be used too. My reasons for wanting to give lacquer a go are:

a) I used poly over an antique style paint finish for protection and it ruined it by turning it yellow, lacquer is "supposed" not to do that.

b) In the US and to some extent the UK it is many woodworkers "go to" finish product and I wanted to explore why.

c) It is a much faster drying product and as I don't have a dust free environment that is a big plus.

d) I enjoy trying things I haven't tried before.

Originally Posted by ubeaut

Globak are a forum sponsor.
Click on their banner in the right hand column or the one below or the one at the top of the Finishing Forum and it will take you directly to their site.

Do we get a discount? ;-)

White Shellac or Hard Shellac won't change the colour of your timber any more than wetting it down with water and shouldn't change the colour of white paint when applied over it. It dries almost as fast as Nitro and precat lacquers and for hardness the Hard shellac is tougher than polyurethane and right up there with nitro etc.

It can be brushed, sprayed or padded (as in French polishing). Similar to what's known as padding lacquer in the USA main difference is that the shellac powder is dissolved in thinners rather than Ethanol to make padding lacquer and may have the addition of a small amount of oil.

Hard shellac pictured on website is a very bad photo of one of our old bottles it and is a light honey colour rather than the dark look in the picture. It is also cut by up to 4 parts ethanol (Methylated Spirits) to 1 part Shellac making it closer to the colour of Sanding Sealer pic.

Hope this is of a bit more help.

Cheers - Neil

I spray 99% of the time, with stains and NC lacquer.
My first choice is Pylon Chemicals for Fast stain (less than 5 seconds drying time) and their Hytech for lacqer. They can deliver, Oz company over Botany way...
If I can't get Hytech then Stylwood is nearly as good, slightly more expensive, but I heard they were looking at their pricing......
Pylons lacquer (thinners base - need the right thinners - I use Diggers) goes very well over water based paint (folkart) as well as acrylic....

Geoff

Geoff, which of their lacquers do you use and what do you pay for it ?
Also, have you used one of their sealers ?

I'm asking because I always like to keep up with products that are out there.

Cheers
Arron