Crate Beast - Crate Finish And Paint

Don't get too close to that crate! There's a monster inside!

WARNING: If you are considering this project, read all Related Pages before you start!

Stain And Weathering
Stenciling
Final Exterior
Related Pages

Stain And Weathering

For the staining and weathering, Dennis used three flavors of Minwax stains:

product	description
Minwax White Oak	This is a water-based stain. If you apply this generously, subsequent coats of oil-based stain don't stick very well.
Minwax Golden Oak	This is a light, oil-based stain. It soaks rapidly into the wood, unless you previously put a lot of water-based stain there.
Minwax Special Walnut	This is a dark, oil-based stain. It soaks rapidly into the wood, unless you previously put a lot of water-based stain there.

Our reasoning was that old wood might be faded and bleached by the sun - hence the white stain. But anything that was kicking around for a long time would be dirty.

So we did a base coat of the white stain, with some smears of the darker colors.

This is basically what it looked like when we were done.

Stenciling

Dennis did the stencil labeling. It was his first project using stencils, and he learned a lot of what not to do.

After some experimentation, it became clear that it was best to put a tiny amount of paint on the brush and then dab or jab it at the stencil. After all the work was doen, David commented that you could get special stencil brushes with shorted, firmer bristles, that are used to dab of jab.

We dought the stencils at Michael's. They had paper, plastic, and brass. They were offered in various sizes in inch increments.

We chose plastic stencils in 3-inch size.
We used whatever black paint we happened to have around, oil-based RUST-OLUM flat black enamel.
It takes a while for the paint to dry. If you apply one stencil right next to the previous one, you will probably smear.

Here, we work on several parts of the lettering at once. As one word is drying, we do another letter in the next word.

After each letter, Dennis wiped excess paint off the stencil sheet, front and back.