Thread: Nice cheap wax finish option - homemade

Have you tried the waxes made by this forum's sponsor?

Perhaps not as cheap as "yours" but it certainly does the job and is consistent in quality from tub to tub.

BTW I am not in any way connected to Ubeaut - just a user of their product and a member of this forum.

Hi Bob,
I make a large batch of the polish and it stores nicely in sealed glass jars. Because I have the ingredients on hand for the polish I make and there are budgetary constraints I prefer not to buy commercially available preparations. I'm sure the forum sponsor's products are great, however I find at present it's quite rewarding to muck around with your own polishes. I have been getting great results on my new furniture with the wax/turps mix and it even smells nice.

Kudos to UBeaut for allowing open exchange of information here, rather than running the forum as an advertising platform

Originally Posted by ScottvB

Hi All,
After a few years using this recipe for homemade timber wax, and comparing it against several commercial brands, I used it on a bunch of fine Eucalyptus teretecorinis funiture recently with slight trepidation but to great effect. I thought I would share the simple recipe here. The original link is:

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/__data/ass...ure-polish.pdf

The recipe I prefer is the beeswax, carnauba wax and gum turps mix. Heat the waxes up until liquid and then add the gum turpentine and stir a little. Leave it to cool and hey presto! Your own cheap and very easy to use and buff timber wax. IT comes up beautifully and lasts for years with a wear-resistant finish (thanks to carnauba wax!).

Cheers!

But where do you get the bees wax and carnauba wax from cheaply?

Making your own can sometimes be false economy, not only in terms of money but more importantly health.

If you want to make it cheaper and safer try using mineral turpentine instead of gum turps which is known to cause kidney failure and mental health problems especially if absorbed through pores of the skin (as ubeaut and others have said in the past).

As a rule if it has strong aromatics like gum (pure) turps it isn't really good for you.

Don't breathe hot fumes or leave the heating wax unattended even if in a double boiler.

Darky

When I run out of old house paint I sometimes make my own "end grain sealer" by using insect repellent candles and melting and mixing them with mineral turps.

A 600 g hard wax candle can sometimes be found on special for <$5, I then melt and mix this with about 3 L of turps using a old saucepan on a old electric fry pan. Once melted and mixed I transfer it back into the 4L PET plastic containers that turps comes in. Depending on the wax used it goes murky and some of the wax even settles out but it easily re-suspends if shaken. I think this is because these candles are not pure wax but have other gunk in them. Some of cheap candles (like those in the little galvanized buckets) appear to have tallow in the wax which does not mix well with mineral turps and needs the gum turps to mix which makes it too expensive.

If wax can be found cheap enough it works out that "end check" can be made for not much more than the price of mineral turps, which, while not as cheap as bulk "end check", it is much less than the ~$10/L for the small volumes of end-check sold at speciality WW stores. It goes on/into end grain much better than old house paint but it does leave a waxy coating that readily absorbs grit and rocks which doesn't go well with any WW blades. It is very effective at reducing end checking.