# Cherry fuming color



## jonsprague0000 (Jan 18, 2014)

I'm building a dining room table out of Cherry and am experimenting with finishes. The long skinny piece of wood in the pictures is finished the potassium dichromate. The rest of the pieces were fumed with ammonia for varying lengths of time. Each piece has several coats of arm-r-seal on top.

As this is my first Cherry project I have a few questions.
1. Which piece do you all like the most?
2. Which piece looks the most like a natural aged piece of cherry?
3. I like the long skinny piece that is finished with potassium dichromate. Is there a way to make the fumed pieces look more like that with a top coat? I feel this one is redder and more vibrant.


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## AlaskaGuy (Jan 29, 2012)

I like number 12


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## timbertailor (Jul 2, 2014)

3) try staining without the ArmorSeal. Cherry and Maple really do not need it in most cases. Might come out a little less red.


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## Pezking7p (Nov 17, 2013)

The one with all the holes in it looks the most like my cherry table, which sits in a pretty sunny spot.


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## CharlesA (Jun 24, 2013)

To each his own. Cherry with arm-r-seal will darken on its own in a few months.


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## jonsprague0000 (Jan 18, 2014)

AlaskaGuy, which piece are you referring to when you say number 12? All the pictures are of the same pieces.

TimberTailor, what do you mean when you say stain without arm-r-seal? The arm-r-seal was applied after the oxidizer was applied. What I want is to make the fumed pieces appear more red and less gray/brown.

Thanks Pezking, the goal is to try and make it as natural as possible.


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## rick1955 (Jun 26, 2014)

There aren't enough tannins in Cherry to fume. White Oak has the most tannins and red Oak as very little. I know fuming very well as our shop uses anhydrous ammonia and we have a 40 foot fuming chamber. The ammonia we use is as strong as you can get. It's in a 100 pound tank 5 feet tall. One blast in your face will kill you. An interesting fact is if you take a piece of a quarter White Oak and fume it for three weeks the color goes completely through the wood.


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## bondogaposis (Dec 18, 2011)

I prefer the look of naturally aged cherry. It is impossible to reproduce any other way.


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## jonsprague0000 (Jan 18, 2014)

Rick, it is possible to fume Cherry. The piece on the left in the top 2 pictures was fumed for 24 hours. Only a few coats of arm-r-seal were applied. After fuming the piece was a lot darker than before. Have you tried fuming cherry in your chamber?


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## CharlesA (Jun 24, 2013)

I'll take an educated guess and look forward to Rick's more definitive reply: when you fume white oak, you change the wood's color permanently and to a shade it won't unattain otherwise, possibly all the way through. When you fume cherry you may hasten the darkening on the surface that will happen naturally within a short period of time.


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## jonsprague0000 (Jan 18, 2014)

Is it possible that a different chemical reaction is happening when fuming cherry rather than oak?


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## TheWoodenOyster (Feb 6, 2013)

Just another option, if you want to go with a less severe aging process, you can just use baking soda. It won't give the same strength, obviously, but it is much safer and way easier to deal with.

As far as which one I like the most, I must say the long skinny one looks good.


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