Woodworking

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A handmade home for woodworkers and admirers of woodworkers. Our community icon is submitted by @[email protected] whose father was inspired to start woodworking by Norm and the New Yankee Workshop.

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Shellac then burn or vice versa? (lemm.ee)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/woodworking

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I would like to wood burn some designs into a nightstand but may want to add more burning down the road, after I coat it with shellac. From what I could gather, people mentioned to only burn and then seal, otherwise the burning after the shellac could cause issues, like releasing inhalants. Is that really an issue with shellac since it is “natural”?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

it is definitely still a problem, the "naturalness" of the finish is irrelevant

even burning wood itself releases compounds that can be harmful (hence why we advise against breathing in smoke)

I second the idea from a separate poster that if you want to burn, seal, and add more burns-- just use a solvent to remove the seal before you do the second set of burns. Or burn it all at once before sealing

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Yeah that’s a good point. Thanks for the suggestions, I’m going to try and burn it all at once, but may need to add things later, so I’ll see how the solvent goes to burn and reseal.