[camilostatis]

Hi everyone

So I have drum kit shells I painted but am planning to strip the paint and start bare ( sorry but I don't know the type of wood it is since I bought them second hand)

What I want to do is make them look like the attached photo.

From what i've been reading, the steps I take are

lightly sand the wood

apply wood pre stain coats

apply stain of choice ( I'm going for espresso stain) coats

This is the part where i'm confused

someone told me to use lacquer, another person said use water based polyurethane and another said use epoxy, and ANOTHER person I saw in a video used both polyurethane (first) then epoxy for that extra glass, glossy look

So basically I want to just make sure all my steps are correct in the first place, then figure out what to do with the epoxy/poly situation

 

[cocomonkeynuts]

That's a dye stain and probably sprayed. Epoxy needs to be poured. Lacquer would be difficult to build to that level of gloss. Polyester resin builds much faster, can be sprayed and sands easy.

 

[Nealtw]

More often that is a glued on skin and there are videos on how to do that.

 

[camilostatis]

That's a dye stain and probably sprayed. Epoxy needs to be poured. Lacquer would be difficult to build to that level of gloss. Polyester resin builds much faster, can be sprayed and sands easy.

So a dye stain and polyester resin?

 

[camilostatis]

More often that is a glued on skin and there are videos on how to do that.

yup but im trying to avoid that route

 

[Nealtw]

yup but im trying to avoid that route

Likely the wood was not pretty enough for finishing If you find that there vinyl stick ons.

 

[camilostatis]

Likely the wood was not pretty enough for finishing If you find that there vinyl stick ons.

i'd rather try to do it myself

 

[camilostatis]

That's a dye stain and probably sprayed. Epoxy needs to be poured. Lacquer would be difficult to build to that level of gloss. Polyester resin builds much faster, can be sprayed and sands easy.

I dont know if this helps or not but these are the shells, its the only photo I have of them bare

 

[huesmann]

Your original photo looks to have a fair bit of grain, but the actual shells don't seem to. Are you OK with not having that much grain appear?

 

[camilostatis]

Your original photo looks to have a fair bit of grain, but the actual shells don't seem to. Are you OK with not having that much grain appear?

yeah there doesnt seem to be much grain, which is ok with me, but I read that stain tends to collect in the grains better and bring them out better than dyes

 

[huesmann]

I did a piece of furniture using stain and then gloss polyurethane and it came out pretty nice. I'd try that on your drum shells. Be careful about spraying the poly on too thick, or you'll get runs. And pay careful attention to any instructions about min/max time between re-coats.

Fortunately for you, you can use the interior of the shell to test out stain colors!

 

[camilostatis]

I did a piece of furniture using stain and then gloss polyurethane and it came out pretty nice. I'd try that on your drum shells. Be careful about spraying the poly on too thick, or you'll get runs. And pay careful attention to any instructions about min/max time between re-coats.

Fortunately for you, you can use the interior of the shell to test out stain colors!

Would wipe on poly be more suitable for this situation?