| Project by JohnGreco | posted 851 days ago | 878 views | 0 times favorited | 6 comments |  |
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My daughter’s school is having a fund raiser event with door prizes, so I thought I’d make something they could offer as one of the prizes.
I had some Cherry that I decided to use to make a set of candlestick holders. The only problem was I had about a week to make them. I wanted them to have a nice patina so people could more easily recognize them as being cherry (I’m not sure many non-woodworkers know how light it is when it’s freshly cut).
After 3 days of cloudy weather, my wife commented that it was too bad I couldn’t just throw them on a tanning bed. Then I thought hey, why not? So I took a drive down to the local tanning salon and after some puzzled looks, a few strange questions (no ma’am, I will not be tanning with them in the bed) and a consent form, I had the pieces booked for a 12 minute session. That’s the first picture.
The second picture is what they looked like before they went tanning, and the third picture is just a couple of hours later with their first coat of tung oil.
2 days after their tanning session and 3 coats of tung oil later, you see them in the final shot. Really makes you wonder what those tanning beds are doing to people’s skin…
As always, thanks for looking.
-- John
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6 comments so far
steliart
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1326 posts in 885 days
#1 posted 851 days ago
That is a very out of the box solution !!!
Great work on those
-- I am not so rich to buy cheap tools.
wseand
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1542 posts in 1239 days
#2 posted 851 days ago
Great candle sticks holders. And, wow on the tanning booths, very cool idea. Just be careful you don’t give them cancer.
-- Bill - "Freedon flies in your heart like an Eagle" Audie Murphy
BigTiny
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1652 posts in 1085 days
#3 posted 850 days ago
Here’s a faster way to get the same effect. Mix a teaspoon full of lye in two cups of distilled water and apply with a sponge. In a couple of minutes you get the same effect as many years of normal aging.
It’s easy, it’s cheap and it works great. Just remember the rubber gloves and eye protection. While it is a relatively weak solution, proper safety measures should still be followed.
-- The nicer the nice, the higher the price!
JohnGreco
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274 posts in 1252 days
#4 posted 850 days ago
Thanks for the kind words, and thank you Big Tiny for the tip! I’m going to have to give that a try :)
-- John
sras
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3259 posts in 1326 days
#5 posted 850 days ago
I’m glad I read your description because I had NO IDEA what that first picture was about! Very creative idea!Alin posted a pretty imformative write up on potassium dichromate for the same result. The nice thing about the tanning bed is no chemicals and you get to see the reaction on people’s faces at the salon!
-- Steve - Impatience is Expensive
JohnGreco
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274 posts in 1252 days
#6 posted 850 days ago
Thanks, Steve. That was a really good write-up.
-- John
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