Any tips on staining Birch Plywood?

[rogybiv]

Hello all,

I'm very new to all this so please excuse my ignorance, I wondered if anyone had any good experience/advice in staining Birch Plywood?

I'm using Birch Ply for shelving and would like to stain the wood a darker finish (more of a teak like colouring). I've read up and it seems Birch Ply can be a bit more awkward than other plywoods... so I wondered if anyone had some good advice on methods and/or brands of pre-stain and stain to work with?

Thanks for reading!

[JonR]

I would say use a sanding sealer first that will give a more even coat of stain, never stained birch ply but it probably would be a bit patchy hence the suggestion.

[Jonathan]

My decorator varnishes it first to seal it, when he tints a varnish to required shade, and then applies the tinted top coats.....

[promhandicam]

The problem with most stains, particularly on bigger areas is unless you are good you risk getting tide marks. I would try something like osmo wood wax which is available in a number of tints and is both easy to apply and hard wearing.

[rogybiv]

Hi All,

First up thank you for reading and replying, much appreciated!

I've been in contact with a stain supplier and the advice I was given was just to go over the surface with white spirit, lightly sand down then go ahead...

I will have wood to test so I'm happy to do some experimenting.

I was planning on getting the following:

Stain - http://www.wood-finishes-direct.com/pro ... f79f36e427
Varnish - http://www.wood-finishes-direct.com/pro ... b6ce85386a

I was going to try a version just as is (using white spirit before), and then a version using the varnish or a thinned down version first and then apply the stain?

As this project is kind of a one off I would like to avoid buying various types of stain/varnish as I don't have the space to keep it anywhere or the money to be able to be quite so frivolous...