DuMont RA-103 Chatham Cabinet Refinish

[M3-SRT8]

I've never seen a Chatham in anything but red mahogany. Try Minwax Red Mahogany Stain #225. Go VERY light passes to start. It's a good match for the DuMont factory tint.

[vts1134]

The cabinet is redder than my photos show. I don't think it started off as red as M3-SRT8's cabinet, but that could just be because it was in pretty poor shape when I got it.
I used a paint called "antique dark walnut" for the bezel. It's a little more purple than chocolate brown. After letting it dry overnight I knocked it down with 0000 steel wool. It took the "just painted" shine off of it and made it much more even. I also put the first coat of grain filler on this morning. I took the advice of the old guy at the wood supply store and went with CrystaLac clear filler. I'm going to give it a very light sand with 320 grit tomorrow morning and put the next coat on. I'll post some progress pictures then.

[M3-SRT8]

Sand INTO THE GRAIN PORES. Very important to do this, or you'll remove the grain fill from the wood.

Depending on how well you leveled the grain fill with the surface of the wood, and how much excess is left on the wood, be prepared to use a lot of 320 grit sandpaper, as it will fill up fast.

Just keep on using fresh sandpaper, and work carefully...

[vts1134]

Originally Posted by M3-SRT8

Sand INTO THE GRAIN PORES. Very important to do this, or you'll remove the grain fill from the wood.

Could you elaborate on "into the grain pores"? I'm not quite understanding what you mean. I was going to sand with the grain as light as I could to remove whatever filler was left on the surface. Is there some other technique that I should employ?

[M3-SRT8]

Yes. Wood grains are composed of exposed pores. They ususlly lie on the surface at an angle. When you drag a dry cloth on the surface WITH the grain, and AWAY from the pores, it doesn't catch on the surface. When you drag a cloth INTO the pores, the cloth catches. Sand INTO the pores.

[leadlike]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQfm0nLXJ7Q

This is part one of three (kind of boring) videos on grain filling. But what is important with this series is that he will probably answer a lot of your questions, and most importantly, you get to see how how the pros do it.

Don't forget, you can save the old grain filler-when you scrape it off the cabinet, toss the excess back into the can.

[vts1134]

Originally Posted by leadlike

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQfm0nLXJ7Q

This is part one of three (kind of boring) videos on grain filling. But what is important with this series is that he will probably answer a lot of your questions, and most importantly, you get to see how how the pros do it.

Don't forget, you can save the old grain filler-when you scrape it off the cabinet, toss the excess back into the can.

Wonderful link! Thank you so much. I applied grain filler on Saturday morning and it was a disaster. I did not use the method shown in the YouTube video. In the process of sanding off the grain filler residue with 320 I took slight amounts of stain off. The result was an uneven color. What I'm going to do now is sand the entire piece down as gently as I can to an even color then gain fill with the above method and re-stain. I think this will give me the result I'm looking for.

[Pielock373]

Here's my doghouse with it's original finish and original stand.