Finally Getting Back to Trailer Work

Time to start up on interior restoration:  

Wood Refinishing First

So after reading up on several other people's refinishing suggestions from the yuku vintage trailer discussion group I decided to go with Shellac on the interior wood refinishing.


Here is our sample test piece on a scrap piece of birch paneling.  We experimented with sanding the bare wood prior to shellacing and not sanding, experimented with the amber tinted shellac and the clear coat shellac and with sanding between coats or not.

Top right side is one coat of amber shellac with 3 coats of clear shellac (best color match)

Final decision was.... (Drumroll)....

     On bare new birch:  Light sand first, then one coat of amber shellace, with three coats of clear shellac on top, sanding with fine grit sand paper and wiping away all the dust in between each coat (this combination seemed to give the best color match to the original panels and it gave the smoothest glossiest finish)

    On the existing original birch: lightly sand it with fine paper and then apply 4 coats of clear shellac - sanding and wiping it clean between coats- this gave the closest color match.  We found that applying any of the amber shellac on top of the original finish made it become just slightly too dark.

Amber and Clear Shellac applied to samples of original paneling

Here we go removing all the cupboard doors and removing all the fixtures getting ready to sand it all.