Thread: Replacement container for wipe on poly and other finishes

I don't know about those finishes, but I use a fair bit of Tung oil in small doses and used to lose a lot from the oil going off over time after opening the tin. Now I use small (200ml?) plastic drink bottles to split the tin into small batches. That works well for keeping it fresh and I suppose it would also work to do what you want. The plastic holds up alright.

I have stored my excess Minwax Wipe-on Poly in 200ml brown plastic bottles and it seems OK. I spoke to the rep at Melb WWW Show recently and he agreed that this should be acceptable.

Thanks Burra and Chesand, looks like plastic will be ok afterall. I have got some glass conatiners somewhere as well so will use them if I can find them.

All the cans of Wipe-on-Poly that i have purchased in the last 12 months or more have a plastic pop top that is easy to open. Maybe you have old stock.

Previous to that they had screw tops and were a constant source of frustration.

Steven.

Glass containers are fine but you have to make sure the lids are air tight. Some plastic containers can contaminate the material and of course some plastics will fail if you put the wrong kind of mixture in them. I have known mineral turps to "melt" some plastics.

bit of glad wrap over the threads will stop it sticking
this stuff goes off like a bomb

Thanks, boys. I am going to try the glad wrap because it's low cost but I do have some glass jars that will be the eventual home for this finish. As regards to this being old stock, I bought the stuff at this year's Wood show in Oct.

G'day Tiger.
Speak of the devil, I discovered today that certain finishes that thin/clean with turps (like poly) degrades certain plastics as munruben said above. That was a messy lesson learned the hilarious way.
PET bottles (i.e. softdrink bottles) are the go for poly. Turps comes in PET bottles after all, and you can screw them shut airtight well enough.
-Matt

I decant drying oils (or varnishes if you use them) into small PET bottles and after using some of the contents from the bottle, I wipe the threads with a turps-soaked rag, screw the top on and then squash the bottle a bit to exclude any air. The contents won't skin over or go off in the absence of air.