tiger maple quilt rack

this is the tiger maple quilt rack that i have been working on for a few months now. first when i put the trace coat on the sanding job wasn’t so great so i sanded it again up to 120. this is so the curl will accept the die more. the i put the trace coat on. it was a general finishes merlot and sanded that off leaving it in the curl with 180. then i consulted with Charles Neil about spraying the Gemini NGR new england maple dye. NGR dries really fast so you gotta move. especially on any curved surfaces because if you are to slow you will get bad results. so he said that i didn’t want to spray it lightly because it would be too even and thats not what we want. we want to pop the curl. so he said to saturate it with the dye with my spray gun because you can really get a lot on there fast. then to use a rag with denatured alcohol on it to wipe the excess back. it will pull of the extra and some off of the long grain but leaving it in the curl. this really pops the grain. then for the topcoat i sprayed shellac. i sprayed 5 coats scuffing it in between with 400 grit and then after the 5th coat i scuffed with 400 grit and then used some steel wool to make sure that it was really smooth. last i sprayed a really thin coat of shellac to bring the luster back to the finish and i was careful to get it right off of the gun because that is when the finish is the clearest and the best. unless you want to do a lot of rubbing out which is hard on these curved surfaces. these pictures don’t really do it justice though. it looks so much better in real life and you can see the curl all around just like in the third picture.