Restoring bannister - couple of questions

joe90mitch

Hi everyone,

Currently working on restoring our bannisters. They had thick gloss paint on most of them and a dark stain/varnish on the handrail. 

On some areas with really gunked up gloss, I used a heat gun to strip it. This worked quite well, but on the balusters I found it took half an hour to just do 1 of 4 sides of one individual baluster. I think we'll just sand and repaint these - just wondering if there's bits with huge blobs of gloss if we stripped just this small area, then tried to "feather sand" the area around it, would this leave a decent finish or would it be quite noticeable?

Then, on the handrail I managed to remove most of the varnish just with a shavehook. beneath it there seems to be a bit of a stain. I quite like it, but in reality should we be removing this stain before reapplying our chosen finish? We just want a fairly natural look, either matt or semi gloss/satin, that shows off the grain of the wood. Also on this note, any recommendations as to the finish (e.g. stain and varnish, just wax, etc?).

Here's an example of the (I assume) varnish being removed and the colouring beneath:



Finally, we have nice acorns on top of the newel posts. These were painted gloss also, I stripped it back. Beneath there's quite a lot of dark colouring that I've been able to sand away a good amount of, so I think they may have been stained originally. If we want the handrail and acorns to match, do we need to sand both right back (or do whatever is required to remove the stain) and then apply the same finish to both? Or if we don't need to remove the stain from the handrail do you think we can just attempt to match it somewhat?

Again an example photo is below, I think it's flattering and makes the grain more pronounced, in reality it is a little paler and "cloudier" (i.e. the grain is less visible) than the handrails. I also appreciate they're not in the best condition (e.g. black bits at the top and there's a few bits of white paint we really struggle to get off), but I think we're happy to pass off small defects as part of the Victorian "charm" of the house



Thanks in advance for the help, it's really appreciated. Sorry if they're obvious questions, I tried googling it all but struggled to find specifics

joe90mitch

Just politely bumping this. Maybe I should summarise  the questions more simply

1. Do you think we need to do anything further to the exposed wood before applying our own stain/varnish/wax? Or is sanding down with 120 grit from here ok enough?
2. If you have areas of wood that seem to have different colours (so presumably different stains/dirt over years?) is it just a case of sanding it all back to a similar finish, then retreating?
3. If we want to end up with the wood looking like it does on the exposed handrail in the photos in a matt or satin finish, any suggestions? E.g. is wax a good approach, or for a handrail should we really be looking at a matt varnish/lacquer?
4. Where there are huge blobs of old gloss on spindles, could we use the heat gun then shavehook that area off, then feather sand the join between gloss and bare wood, then paint? Or will this be extremely noticeable?

Quorden

This brings back painful memories, spent a fair while a few years ago doing the same to our bannister and stairs which had decades worth of paint layers on them. In my humble opinion..

1) Think for the handrail I smoothed off using 80 grit, but if it feels smooth to you at 120 then why make more work for yourself, then didn't do any other prep work before applying wood wax.
2) There's only so much sanding you can do before you start making dips into the wood, as we used a dark wood wax the difference's aren't really noticeable but if you're going for perfection then sand away!
3) I used wood wax,  easy to apply and very durable (haven't had to reapply in four years), you can get clear wax so think this would work.
4) If you do it properly shouldn't be noticeable, we pretty much used every tool and chemical known to mankind to take all the paint off, in hindsight probably would have been cheaper just to buy a staircase
 

joe90mitch

Awesome @Quorden, thanks for the tips. And yes I've already amassed a shed's worth of shavehooks/heatguns/sandpaper/wirewool/etc etc. It's hard work, but I guess the thinking is I'll only do it once and I love bringing back old features that have gone "unloved" over the years.

Do you (or anyone else) know if there's anything in particular to look for when buying wood wax? Or just a case of pretty much any clear wood wax should suffice?

daivid

You can make your own wax. How much is for protection of the wood and how much is for appearance? I've made my own beeswax/carnuba mix which gives a nice finish after buffing up but probably offers little in protection (it will stop watermarks from a light spill and probably prevent grubby handprints forming).
Incidentally 120 grit is finer than 80 and if you are rubbing over with wire wool prior to waxing then that is in effect finer still. I would wire wool the bare wood then rub down with a clean cloth infused with white spirit before waxing - but follow the instructions on whatever wax/finishing you choose.

joe90mitch

I guess protection Vs appearance is what we're unsure of obviously we want it to look nice, but we'd rather not end up with grubby marks from hands running up it etc. So your suggestion sounds decent. Not overly worried about having to reapply every few years or anything, either.

ciderboy2009

I've always used Briwax for my wooden bits around the house - including on a window cill on a South facing window which I used to have to regloss every 18 months or so due to sun damage.  I Briwaxed it a couple of years ago and it's still looking great.

They do a good selection of colours (I tend to use Antique Brown on pine) and goes on easily.  However, the chemical smell when using it can be overpowering so you need to make sure you've got plenty of windows open.