I can’t see a problem on the small screen of my phone Jon but it otherwise looks really nice.
Question on sanding a cutting board
I recently built a cutting board from maple, walnut and cherry cut offs and have a couple of questions regarding how the sanding process may or may not have impacted the appearance of the finished board.
The maple/walnut combinations (IMG 1927 & 1929) were glued to a solid piece of cherry and that slab ripped into sections on the TS. These sections were rotated resulting in an end grain board (IMG 2338).
The board was initially cleaned on the drum sander at 80 grit and finished with an ROS through 220 grit.
The first problem arose following the application of the Hunter’s Butcher block oil (mineral oil, bees wax combination) which appeared as a bright “stripe” running through the center of the board (IMG 2340).
My thought is that I had made a random pass across the board with the ROS and the oil failed to soak in evenly across the surface. Comments?
Based on the appearance of the above I used the drum sander to take it down to bare wood and repeated the sanding with the ROS up to 220 grit. I then ran a damp cloth lightly across the surface to slightly raise the grain, repeated the ROS with just the 220 grit and re-applied the oil finish. While this successfully eliminated the “stripe”, if you enlarge the photo (IMG 2353) you should notice that the fine grain in the cherry really shows through. I’ve not seen this on previous boards and the only change I made was to dampen the board prior to the final sanding. The question, should I have dropped back to a lower grit and worked up to 220 rather than just running the 220 as the final pass with the ROS? Comments?
The last photo reflects the edge of the board (IMG 2361) which was not re-sanded.
The maple/walnut combinations (IMG 1927 & 1929) were glued to a solid piece of cherry and that slab ripped into sections on the TS. These sections were rotated resulting in an end grain board (IMG 2338).
The board was initially cleaned on the drum sander at 80 grit and finished with an ROS through 220 grit.
The first problem arose following the application of the Hunter’s Butcher block oil (mineral oil, bees wax combination) which appeared as a bright “stripe” running through the center of the board (IMG 2340).
My thought is that I had made a random pass across the board with the ROS and the oil failed to soak in evenly across the surface. Comments?
Based on the appearance of the above I used the drum sander to take it down to bare wood and repeated the sanding with the ROS up to 220 grit. I then ran a damp cloth lightly across the surface to slightly raise the grain, repeated the ROS with just the 220 grit and re-applied the oil finish. While this successfully eliminated the “stripe”, if you enlarge the photo (IMG 2353) you should notice that the fine grain in the cherry really shows through. I’ve not seen this on previous boards and the only change I made was to dampen the board prior to the final sanding. The question, should I have dropped back to a lower grit and worked up to 220 rather than just running the 220 as the final pass with the ROS? Comments?
The last photo reflects the edge of the board (IMG 2361) which was not re-sanded.
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It could be something about that particular piece of wood, unless it crosses several pieces. Could be a smear of glue, squeezeout spread accidentally. Might be appropriate to use a really sharp, good plane to resurface the entire board and try finishing again. Or resand and use a scraper? However, I can't see anything wrong in your picture. Might show up better with a strong side light. Those are my thoughts anyhow. BTW, I no longer use sandpaper. 3M makes a flexible sanding medium that provides a tremendous finish for me. The stuff lasts far longer than paper sanding medium. Here's a pix.
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