Cedar of lebanon dissolving wax and oil?

[johnj]

Hi All,

I made a jewellery box fairly recently (pics below) with sliding internal boxes made from unfinished cedar of lebanon. Smells lovely and worked fine, but a few days later the finsih on the inside of the box was wet and sticky. I cleaned it off, tried carnuba wax with the same results. I had put a hard wax oil on the box before the wax so tried cleaning off the wax with meths and leaving it at that but it kept happening.

And is still happening! I havn't heard of this phenomena before and was wondering if anyone here had any experience of similar and any solutions. I'm thinking its probably the natural turpentine from the cedar seeping into the air in the box. Still not really sure how to deal with it though.

Cheers,
John
http://www.radiancefurniture.co.uk

 

[cornucopia]

I've had this problem with lebanese cedar before- I found that after a few months it sorted itself out

 

[johnj]

Well, its been a few months now and it still seems to be happening. I think I'll have to try taking the drawers out and cleaning the inside of teh box again with meths. Then possibly seal the outside of the drawers with oil or sanding sealer or something to try and reduce the contact of the cedar with the box.

I'll have to be careful with the cedar from now on!

 

[tekno.mage]

I've also had problems using cedar of lebanon - I made a turned box from it and finished it with melamine lacquer before I realised what a problem the cedar can be - the lacquer failed and sticky resin seeped through within a few days :-( I gave up with the box in the end. Not sure what can be done to stop this happening. I have an old carved box made of cedar of lebanon that my mother gave me - and now I look at it closely it has no finish on it at all aside from what is probably furniture polish (applied by mother I suspect) on the outside. It still smells lovely when you open the box.

 

[Woodfinish Man]

John,
It might be better to clean off the oil residue with white spirit and then seal it all in with a thin coat of Transparent Shellac Polish. It never fails to surprise us how often this system works for highly resinous timbers. Think you should avoid shellac sanding sealer, the zinc stearate contained within it may affect the drying.

Hope this helps
Ian

 

[johnj]

Thanks for the replies Kym and Ian. I dont think I've got any transparent shellac in unfortunately, although thanks for the tip. I'll remember it for the future. i was thinking of using cellulose sanding sealer, I'll do a test piece and see if it works. If thats no good I'll get some of the shellac.

I'm hoping its only the sides directly in contact with the inside of the box that need sealing. I wouldnt want to loose the smell upon opening the box.
cheers,
John

 

[woodbrains]

Hello,

Shellac is your answer, as a sealer, and then you can overcoat this with pretty much anything you want. Use de waxed shellac if you want to put on a different top coat, or else stick with the shellac. The big question is; why coat the inside of the box at all? Traditionally, the smell was desirable, so no finish would be applied so as not to mask the aroma. This obviously circumvents any possible drying of the finish problems, which is a well noted phenomenon of ceder. It is a bear to get anything to dry on and last, aside good old shellac.

Mike.

 

[johnj]

Thanks Mike, I left the sliding boxes unfinished to get the aroma. The inside of the main box I finished with oil and wax. I hadnt heard about the problems cedar of lebanon created for drying finishes. The oil and the wax were fine until a little while after the box was finished, when they became soft and sticky. It was was only where the sliding boxes were sat against the sides that became soft.

Anyway, I've cleaned it up a few times now with white spirit and meths, and it seems to be ok at the moment so probably there is no finish left there anymore.

All I can say is I'm glad this was for the wife and not a client!