How To Finish an Epoxy + Wood Table (For Beginners + Pro's)

today we're going to teach you how to finish an epoxy and wood table we've finished hundreds of epoxy tables and we find these methods are the best way to get the best results once your epoxy is cured and you take it out of the form it's time to flatten the piece so the epoxy and wood are at the same thickness on a larger piece like this we'll use our cnc to flatten the piece so the wood and epoxy are the same thickness now if you don't have a cnc there are other options such as a planer a router sled or on smaller fills you can go straight to your sander once our piece is flattened we like to start off with a very low grit like a 40 grit just to make sure that we can remove any of those machine marks or any imperfections on a standard dining table this step normally takes about 45 minutes to an hour after we finish the 40 grit we'll water pop it and you can see here we're just using a spray bottle and a rag so we'll mist the table and then wipe the water around with the rag to evenly distribute it this step normally will raise any of the imperfections or parts that we need to pay more attention when hitting it with 60 grit after water popping we normally wait about 45 minutes to an hour for that water to dry up before we sand at the next grit on a dining table like this we'll spend about 30 to 45 minutes per each grit one of the biggest mistakes i see is people rush the sanding process and they end up with poor results at the end the sanding normally takes quite a while and is the majority of the project as a general rule of thumb you can aim to move your sander approximately one inch per second after sanding at 60 grit 80 grit 100 grit and 120 grit we will normally water pop again to raise the grain after that we'll hit it at 150 grit for 30 minutes then water pop then hit it at 180 grit for 30 minutes and then water pop again after sanding at 180 grit it's time to address those small pin holes these pin holes are from air bubbles trapped in the epoxy for this we use our akfix 705 we start by putting the cyano glue into a small mixing cup then we add the same color pigment that we used in the initial pour so this pour will match the original pour after a quick mix we'll use our mixing stick to fill all those voids we find it best to place the cyanoglu right next to the hole and let it drip in so that it doesn't trap air in there again which would be exposed when you go to sand this epoxy off after filling all the pinholes we'll use the activator to give it a quick mist which cures the epoxy and makes it ready to sand again sometimes you need to repeat this step a few times because when you're sanding the epoxy down you may expose other air pockets after we are happy with all our small fills we'll normally hit the edges with the router we normally give it a quarter inch round over which gives it a nice smooth edge without taking too much away next up we'll give it a quick water pop and then we'll sand all the edges and the top at 220 grit we normally spend 45 minutes to an hour at 220 grit because you're going to want to give this step a little bit more attention and make sure everything's smooth and up to your standards lately we've been using this rubio monaco raw wood cleaner to give the table a wipe down before we oil it's not totally necessary but we find we get more consistent results when using it it takes about 45 minutes to an hour for that raw wood cleaner to dry and then you're ready to oil we use rubio monaco pure on all our river tables it's a two-part finish so you've got the oil and the accelerator which are mixed at a three to one ratio we find it easiest to use the digital scale to measure out the three to one mixture for this table we're mixing up 100 milliliters of the oil and then we'll add 33 milliliters of the accelerator next up we'll give our mixture a good mix make sure the accelerator is thoroughly mixed with the oil and then it's time to pour the oil onto our work piece there's two different ways that we use to spread the oil and on this table we chose to use a squeegee the squeegee works well and is less wasteful than one of the buffing pads since they are a single use product we will typically only use the buffing pad if we could finish multiple tables in the same day that way we get multiple uses out of it when spreading the oil you want to make sure that you don't miss any areas because you want that oil to cover the entire surface and absorb into the pores of the wood sometimes you'll notice that some parts of the wood will look a little dry and we'll normally give it another pass with oil there just to make sure that it absorbs the right amount the working time on the rubio is about 15 minutes so if you don't think you can complete your project by oiling and wiping off the excess oil in 15 minutes you're going to want to do your project in sections which is okay because there's no lap marks between finishing different spots it's important to finish both sides of your table you want an even finish on both sides so that you don't get unequal airflow underneath which may result in warping or twisting of the table we always start with the underside of the table wipe off the excess oil then flip it over and that's when we will do our top and all of our edges and you're going to want to make sure that you check the underside of the table once you're doing that top side to make sure there's no drips underneath once you've spread your oil over the entire work piece it's time to wipe off the excess oil we use white ball shop towels to wipe off the excess oil and the few key points here are to keep wiping until no more oil is coming up on your shop towels one mistake people make is they don't wipe off enough of the excess oil and you end up with a kind of gummy unsmooth finish it's important to dispose of the oil soaked rags properly these can spontaneously combust in the right conditions now it's rare but if it does happen it could be detrimental so we always lay ours flat out on the shop floor let them dry overnight and then dispose of them or we place them in a sealed metal drum that we keep outside that's full of water here's a few shots of the finished table we hope you enjoyed this and got some value from it if you have any questions let us know in the comments you

Channel: Jeff Mack Designs

Views: 379,631

Keywords: Woodworking, DIY, How, To, Jeff, Mack, Designs

Id: Rddp1G-3lkk

Length: 7min 20sec (440 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 25 2021