• Happy Weed Appreciation Day! 🌱🌿🌻

How do you preserve your finishes

Joined
Jul 18, 2016
Messages
979
Reaction score
567
Location
Bowmanville, Ontario
After opening finishing products like varnish, I find the can starts to "skin" and just gets worse as it gets lower .... end result is usually a lot of wasted varnish. These cans aren't cheap, so 2 years ago I transferred the last 1/4 of a Epiphanes quart to a finish storage bags, as a test. I forgot about it and while doing a recent project, pulled it out and the quarter can is still perfect.

The bags I got are from are from Lee Valley, there are likely other suppliers, they cost about $5 cdn ... seemed steep when I first tested them, but a can of varnish is a lot more and these bags seem to eliminate a lot of the waste and storage issues.

http://www.leevalley.com/en/Wood/page.aspx?p=72867&cat=1,190,44133&ap=1

So I just took a can of Helmsman Spar varnish that looked like this

Se5-xYmUY_-lS38FBALXVzHW8AVEkCP_aBIl8Wvap1zYAUsLPq-UjD71Vg2ypbKh3wzp8gxoAsRml6I42Qbo0Z1IlEquwx838EwESLhLN-gdlqYY4GYbz6LFo1bQA06c2BDg_nJViOKRy5M3xTRYBU-8w4Xxm0lKzu5gcFGQaPcuF0vdpYOAzmJIH88RrGeITQGxcH4KmRvRF1jZIIv3f6MFsRW1ZJ-CV2V2PujDy8uyiW9ib1BWef8SZjBcK5saCj_dWaFRuyPQW8qWYLyw9ePuwP1IBufXlMxOmLytLsD0Rh3J-EuLO4h9QL48qy-fTGn6jYdrgq4PptNZYfaFnbz5nazMaGHcr61EomEjxut_EvAXCj_gwoJ1Tn3Lfkh2_NCOXxSMNOJ92uLu4CvNMVXVXRDO3amasa8EGXRDm0MRXEa00DuogLIGKBGCpFozkfII2wzeR-BleL7EDH1dGvpdMEnTu-iItuKDxw1UmsXFUOjF9GA_YazQcUqTDcV8LLDUYViDVZIjpy1BNqXSGMRLnGLNOCaoJnZMv3gIMu3ObUVjkixF0Y29SfnKxsTWYyzG99wNtTi4oTXjBqttrKNrdDzUIeKf1Ah8gqukuQE5ta0xUPAdPvlaPXPUrEMIhaYZ8dTxfUIVOtBTReEYs3XgbbmvzqE=s893-no


into the storage bag and now I should get to use all the varnish, with no waste or storage problems

HRWgz1T1fmMfuplnIUQSrU458KIXthTN6G1Qi1RhNytWtG3XhowB6NeYJAdksBjnYcwnh4-sZvQwBaUiUrK8JKNO13tcS3vl_t97Q3YPhbASFV1Y4pOypjbExw7yOAaGEqMrjjR4Lb6zrD2bQvyTHkrVgswOPJMmL5SkLQtFL2jdotr3aDjQbAu-E5zbuRCQkK8xV0h3QFOalGVrOHjHWMh1S_2tLxz3XwIKnQCLCbweVd-6Bt0FWjeYG2Cw1lnM3tu6aN2Txy6dnJuCtzZbT_uYQl-y7LrvaC1UoBgQowKcpcBEeRjJuyCEk24X8ESE9DvsubsdesE8iTjeU4K9AMq6lCmubpvJRGfYIGh6rFWustdaSu-VfHRoMenghZQJqfnNvUeTyOcL9djMQWZloj8VAsq-yyPG2QrdzbmJsrUO0VigAIea1XU9xg-sLKZDygW0f_Tyzi-lR82yw5t5wrqgEjlSUsM47bXtKMJ0sQ0TDW4A3wvjxjA2dP2NJPXdVQo4ZG28PniU3M7bzBfSe64d34epnZUzY5aOmFtXalmABWcu8OmrjkEsIr377L0P0IeRdgeo4gJnbtE7Bn63H540fPGCrXre2mKz92iWYpkl-CgzsH5-NL02kc_y3fwgvLOSIE7s8wGGSckDGCqYno6UBU5R34U=s893-no


Likely some have heard or even use these, this tip is for the others that haven't


Bri
 
You can also put something into the container to take up space and make it full again. With small containers marbles work well.
 
I'm also tired of wasting expensive varnish. I wonder if just using a small plastic pop bottle would work as well. They're free and you can squeeze extra air out of those too, and from experience, I know that they have a really good seal. I'll try this next time and see if it works.

Mark
 
With all alkyd type paints and varnishes, and there are fewer of those nowadays, and if I can remember to, I like to store the cans upside down. In any case the inside rim must be quite clean, for easier lid removal, and the lid firmly seated. There will still be a pocket of air inside but the skin formed will be below the liquid with the can turned rightside up again, rather than sealing it between liquid and lid, know what I mean? Not a world changer I know, but it saves me some grief when I remember to do this. Just checked my paint and varnish cans on the work shelf, and they're all sitting rightside up. Oh.
I like this storage bag idea, and at about a buck a bag it's not an overly expensive fix. I was in the grocery store with my wife last evening (against my will) and happened to walk down the baby aisle. Pushing away the clouds of good and bad memories I slowed down as I passed the goopy snacks in plastic resealable sippy bags. I remembered them from a lightweight hikers' video, in which refillable soft containers options were being compared. They fared well in the durability test IIRC. I also remembered our g-sons sucking some kind of healthy gloopy yoghurty vegetable/fruit drink from these soft sided pouches (and wondered just when had my g-kids become space cadets). Nearly identical resealable bags as the Lee V ones but smaller and not clear sided, and way more than buck a bag. So not worth the purchase, unless you have a crew of 5 year old space cadets. I do but instead I'll try harder to remember to turn my cans upside down. But I like the bag idea.
 
Odyssey, right side up, upside down .... either way you get a skin on the varnish once it is below ~3/4 of a can, that skin is wasted varnish and it only gets worse as you use the can and reseal it.

These bags eliminate that skinning, in fact (for example) if you use the same product for varnishing, I don't see any reason (other than damage) that you can't continue using the bag for the next can and the next ..... with Epiphnaes running about ~$70/L and a bag costing ~$5/ea, the economics is there for me. I imagine rinsing them with mineral spirits would clean them up, so they could be used for a different product as well, so they may be more of an investment like any other tool in the shop, just this one is for taking care of finishing products.

I won't be using them for everything, but there are a few higher use products that are expensive and need to have a longer shelf life for me (maybe that Tung Oil as well), so I have a few of the bags now to play with and see how they hold up.

Dogbrain, we certainly have enough of those bottles around, I am not sure how they would hold up to mineral spirits, I do know they work for alcohol .... if you run any tests , let us know.

Brian
 
Good trick Brian !

I always steered away from Gallon cans of varnish, for just that reason. Once I bought empty quart cans, but again you were faced with half quart situations !

A trick I heard years ago, was to bleed off Propane (not lit) from a hand torch, into the can, and quickly close the lid, trapping the gas inside. The idea was to displace the Oxygen, there by reducing the chance of Skinning. I tried it, but can't remember if it worked ! Ha !

Jim
 
Jim, that actually should work .... the idea is to displace the oxygen. You can also buy cans of pressurized Argon and put a shot in , just as you close the lid .... it is used to preserve an open bottle of wine, or air sensitive products like paint/varnish/finish oils.

However, I find that a bit of a hassle as I either forget where the spray is or am too lazy to go get it.

Another thing with cans ... be honest ... how many times does the lid end up "compromised" so it doesn't work right anymore .... is that common or am I the only one who manages to mess them up?
 
Another thing with cans ... be honest ... how many times does the lid end up "compromised" so it doesn't work right anymore .... is that common or am I the only one who manages to mess them up?

Honestly? Somewhere between all too often and all the time. I get sloppy, don’t clean out the lip, the varnish hardens there and the lid never fits right again.

Oh, the lip is crusty and the lid doesn’t fit? I’ll just hit it with a hammer. Now the edge of the can is bent. I (sometimes) do the propane trick, but like Jim don’t know how effective it is because the lid is too often compromised. Bloxygen is $10 can, gets mixed reviews and would be of little help with a messed up lid.

https://www.woodworkingshop.com/pro...MInsm14OSa4QIVDFqGCh1u6w_QEAQYAiABEgIwBPD_BwE

I use mostly quart cans of varnish, urethane and paint. What I want to find is a source of (inexpensive) clean pint cans, so I can decant leftovers into a clean receptacle and eliminate most of the headspace. If I have more than a pint remaining I can always find something that needs a lick of varnish or paint.

I have found clean quart cans at the hardware store. I have found pint cans on-line at a ridiculous price. I have started cleaning out old stain cans, but most of mine are ½ pint.
 
Honestly? Somewhere between all too often and all the time. I get sloppy, don’t clean out the lip, the varnish hardens there and the lid never fits right again.

Oh, the lip is crusty and the lid doesn’t fit? I’ll just hit it with a hammer. Now the edge of the can is bent. I (sometimes) do the propane trick, but like Jim don’t know how effective it is because the lid is too often compromised. Bloxygen is $10 can, gets mixed reviews and would be of little help with a messed up lid.

https://www.woodworkingshop.com/prod...iABEgIwBPD_BwE

I use mostly quart cans of varnish, urethane and paint. What I want to find is a source of (inexpensive) clean pint cans, so I can decant leftovers into a clean receptacle and eliminate most of the headspace. If I have more than a pint remaining I can always find something that needs a lick of varnish or paint.

I have found clean quart cans at the hardware store. I have found pint cans on-line at a ridiculous price. I have started cleaning out old stain cans, but most of mine are ½ pint.

Remember when there was a shelf above your Dad's workbench, on which sat Mason jars of screws and junk...and paints and varnishes?

As per the compromised can rim, no. I can honestly swear I don't own any of that. But I do on occasion have to struggle with other people's buggered up cans. It burns my toast having to wrestle with a paint/varnish can I know I closed and stored properly only a year previous, but the subsequent "handy person" made a mess of my clean and neat and labelled system. There is a season for everything, including taking it all to the hazardous waste depot and replacing with new.
 
Last edited:
An older thread, but thought I would add this as an experiment. The local hardware store had a big sale and I was able to get a gallon of McCloskey spar varnish for $45. This is what I have used for a couple cedar strip canoes and the 1928 Old Town I restored a couple years ago, or was that last year? I don't remember. Anyway, it seems to be decent varnish and I am used to it now, so no surprises for me to get a halfway decent finish.

I decided to use Gatorade bottles to split up the gallon. They have a wide mouth, so I should be able to dig out any skin that might form on top. I have used these as backpacking water bottles for many years now and have never had one fail. No leaks and no cracking even with hard use.

It turns out that I was able to fill 3 quart sized gatorade bottles, 1 - 20 oz gatorade bottle and an old nalgene 4 oz bottle with nothing but a few drops left over. I filled each of the bottles to within a few millimeters of the top.

IMG_1960b.JPG

I don't know how long it will take me to get through this much varnish, maybe 2 years? I'll update this thread over time as I break into each successive bottle.

Mark
 
My concern is that the plastic will degrade.

I could be wrong, but I'd keep it some where if it leaked, it could be contained, like a 5 gal bucket. Also a place I could easily view it often.

I have bought quart cans in the past, but don't remember if it was economical !

Good luck !

Jim
 
My concern is that the plastic will degrade.

I could be wrong, but I'd keep it some where if it leaked, it could be contained, like a 5 gal bucket. Also a place I could easily view it often.

I have bought quart cans in the past, but don't remember if it was economical !

Good luck !

Jim

I'm not really worried about that Jim. I've had ski base solvent stored in one of these for 15 years and it appears to be the same as the day I filled it from a big jug at the local ski shop. This is one of the other reasons i chose the Gatorade bottles. I keep these kinds of things stored in a cool dark place too.

the quart cans are $2.75 each and I'm too cheap to spend the extra money on those.

Mark
 
My concern is that the plastic will degrade.

I could be wrong, but I'd keep it some where if it leaked, it could be contained, like a 5 gal bucket. Also a place I could easily view it often.

Some years ago I bought a gallon of ZipWax car wash in a plastic jug, way more than we needed or would use quickly, but the price was too good to pass up. Last year I noticed that my shop had an unusual chemical odor and began investigating the shelves with solvents, oils, varnishes and etc.

Stored inside the shop, with no UV exposure, the plastic ZipWax container had degraded to the point that it was leaking. I decanted what was left into a 2 liter soda bottle, and stored that in a gallon coffee can just in case. So far, so good, but I still have little faith in the long term durability of plastic containers.

My local hardware store does sell shiny virgin quart cans; I don’t remember the prices, less than $3 IIRC. Unfortunately most of my paints and varnishes are purchased in quart cans. I have started cleaning out old pint and half pint stain cans once the contents are gone and reusing them. That has worked well and I still have a handy can shape to dip a brush into.
 
Wow, this thread made a comeback ....

The bags I originally posted are still fine, I just used some of the original Epiphanes that had no skin and also the same for a bag with Helmsman ... these bags are specifically made for this purpose. Plastic degrading IMO is simply that it was poor quality to begin with or is used for something it wasn't intended for. I have had food grade containers fall apart after a year sitting outside (they aren't rated for uV exposure), another example was a jug of windshield fluid, container went brittle after 6 months sitting outside, while a second sat in the shed and was fine.

Repurposing plastics is pretty dicey as so many look alike, it is difficult to know what the plastic "is" and what it was designed to do ... purchasing for purpose can cost more, so it becomes a cost/benefit in our respective heads, for me, if I am trying to store an expensive varnish like Epiphanes, that is going to skin and ruin in a tin or larger container, I will buy a purpose made bag everytime ... no head space, plastic for purpose and best of all a few years of solid operating results. My buddy gave me some commercial solvent alcohol, it went into a repurposed plastic bottle, it is all about the "What happens if it fails?" question as to how important it is to spend a little on your finish containers.

As far as using tins, they are stable, but I have also had tins go bad and leak, I suspect most of us have .... plus for finishes like varnish, they pretty much suck for storage of any remaining product, this is true for quite a few of the finishes we use.

I am not surprised that a ZipWax container failed and leaked all over, the commercial bottles are as cheap as they can be made ... I had a bug spray ("Off") bottle on a shelf in the medicine cabinet, it leaked on to the plastic shelf and melted the shelf ..... so both container and the shelf it landed on was obviously not good for purpose.


Brian
 
The bags I originally posted are still fine, I just used some of the original Epiphanes that had no skin and also the same for a bag with Helmsman ... these bags are specifically made for this purpose.

I do like the plastic-purposed bags, or the Gatoraide bottles if they work, for one “I’m sloppy” purpose.

I do not like carrying around even a quart can, top off and open, as I am working. More prolonged exposure to air, and a bigger mess if I eff up and slippery fingered drop it*, so I try to decant an appropriate amount into a smaller working container and put the lid back on. And of course rolling requires filling the pan.

If there is one place I am all but guaranteed to get extra messy it is trying to decant something from a full can. Way too much, way too everydamnwhere, including inside the can rim (and on the bench, and my shoes. . . .)

Instead of pouring I dip cupfuls from the can and pour that into another container. Perhaps there is some other trick to that?

A follow-up question – if there is wet paint or varnish or etc in the can rim how do folks clean it out before putting the lid back on? When I try to run a rag or swab around the rim I just chase it in circles, and half of it drips down the outside of the can.

*Maybe childhood trauma. I dropped a nearly full quart of black paint on the floor of my father’s shop as a youngster. It exploded everywhere. My first thought was “I’m dead”. My second and third thoughts were “Clean this up as best I can” and “Bury my clothes out in the woods so mom doesn’t know”

Neither plan was entirely successful.
 
Back
Top