Home made wood stains

I’ve had good luck with artists oil paint and mineral spirits. I keep a few shades of brown, white, black around.

-- Bruce from Central New York

Iodine vapor makes a lovely dark purple finish. I found out quite by accident when storing Iodine crystals in my daguerreotype sensitizing chamber.

-- Custom Daguerreotypes from your images and more: www.shinyphotos.com

Trans Tints: Not truly homemade, bit versatile for making NGR stain when mixed with alcohol, or used to tone clearcoats. Link has an overview of different staining options at Jeff Jewitt’s Homesteadfinishing.com

-- "Bordnerizing" perfectly good lumber for over a decade.

I have used Tumeric (Yellow) and coco (brownish) to stain wood. I have used it dry, mixed with water and mixed with soy oil. I have had varied results . . . but they all stain.

I have thought about using beet juice (red/purple), but have not attempted it.

-- The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them

blueberries would work as well

-- Bob, Carver Massachusetts, Sawdust Maker http://www.capecodbaychallenge.org

I’ve read about people using strongly brewed tea.

For natural pigments, Iron Oxide (rust) is well known for red. Supposedly, livestock blood is the pigment in the milk paint commonly used to paint barns before some point in history. Since I have very few resources for livestock blood (none really), I’ve thought of using dried blood (gardening supplies) before, but haven’t tried that. Not sure if that’s a good idea or not yet.

Flowers or insects can provide natural pigments also.

I’ve had some good success experimenting with milk paint using the RIT dyes you can buy in the supermarket.

A tip on pigments is to slake them, or finely crush and mix them into a paste before adding them into your base (oil, milk, shellac, whatever).

-- Matt - Syracuse, NY

I heard about using Walnut Husks to stain wood.

-- Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com

I’ve had varying success with a strong solution of chewing tobacco steeped in very hot water.

As Karson said, black walnut hulls will work, but the hulls themselves leave a dark stain on the hands, so wear gloves when handling them.

-- Orv

shoe polish works. cordova adds nice shading.

-- ..... art for lifes sake ... danwalters@lumberjocks.com

For the most part I make my own stains sorta?............. I use a product made by becker Acroma called “Neatrul New” and buy clear. This is the best stain I have come across to date as it also can act as a glaze.

I also stock “universal fine grind tints”. They are much the same as the tints you see in paint stores but ground to a much finer/smaller particle. By stocking the following colours I can make almost any colour in the rainbow.

titanium white/lamp black/sienna brown/burnt umber/yellow oxide/red/.............might be a green, a blue…..

anyway they work like a charm and leave little if any blotching. I can thin them and use them to shade or add directly to the lacquer to tint.

-- http://www.furnituremann.ca/