Bleaching yew

Hi everyone,

I am making a table in yew and would love to be able to treat it so that the beautiful golden colour of freshly sawn wood remains. I am thinking of trying some kind of bleach but my instincts tell me that the wood will still darken on exposure to light.

Can anyone suggest a finishing process which will prevent the wood darkening

Thanks a lot

are you talking about old timber
If you want to rejuvatate the colour,
wash it down with oxalic acid.
if you want to take off the naturally time darkened appearance sell the timber to a restorer who need it and buy new!!

astrid

sorry,
I think yew will always darken over time.
maybe a finish with a UV protector if such a thing is availabe
astrid

Woods that darken naturally will do so, in time no matter what you try.

Bleaching, will make the woods color lighter, but then you won't have that golden yellow hue any more. Also, bleach is an acid, so, in time it will turn that light bleach color into a yellow color on its own, and it will be nothing like the color that you want.

When you decide to coat the woods, you may want to consider using a "water clear coating," these coatings do not have an amber caste like nitrocellulose, and do not yellow overtime.

Keep the table out of the sunlight.

oxalic acid is not a bleach in that it makes timber paler, its more of a rejuvinator eg if you put it on timber that is sun faded it wil,l in many cases restore the natural colour
eg if you put it on weatherd timber it will bleach out the weathring but not change the natural colour ( itried this on cedar and it only freshened the colour didnt touch the old timber
its available in hardhare shops safe and cheap

astrid

Thanks everyone for ypur prompt, generous advice.

My best bet seems to be a "water-clear" finish as advised together with keeping the table out of direct sunlight. That's not much of a problem in our climate !

Thanks again,

Myles

Hi Myles, How does this bleached yew look at this moment? Was it a good method to ne used?