staining Osage Orange

[getoverit]

Has anybody done any staining of Osage Orange?

I've got a little project  I'm working on and I would like to somehow darken the color of the osage to more of a brown color rather than the bright yellow it is now. is there something out there that will stain it?

[iffy]

If you can find some stuff that has been dead for a long time, it will be a beautiful brown inside. Harder than the hubs of heck too. Never have tried to stain it.

[Burlkraft]

Dye might work well mixed with alcohol. I use it on maple all the time

[getoverit]

Thanks Steve!  I hadnt thought about using a dye on it. I had some blue dye out int he shop, so I mixed a little up with lacquer thinner and it did dye the softwood part of the boards and slightly darkened the hard parts. I'll play with this a little and see how it goes.

Thanks again!
Ken

[TexasTimbers]

Ken, the UV rays of the sun will darken it in a matter of days. The more darker you want it the longer you leave it out. Don't worry, we aren't talking months or even weeks here. If it is thin you will not want it to dry out and crack though.

What are the dimensions? You could keep it under a sprinkler in the sun and it would not crack the surface and it would still darken I would think. unless it is kiln dried already then I'd scratch that plan.  :

[IL Bull]

That's right,  the sun will make it the color of milk chocolate. :P

[woodsteach]

I second what kevin said.  The UV rays will darken it I don't know about milk chocolate though :.  But then again I don't know what color I'd call it but definately not the bright yellow.



This mail box post was a day or two old when I took the pix.  If I can get batteries for the camera I'll try to get a current pix and one of an end table that was made of osage orange.

The mailbox post just has marine spar varnish on it.

woodsteach

[TexasTimbers]

I'll take some pics tomorrow of some that has been out in sun for a long time, but has had the same degree of color since about the third week it was under it unprotected.

That spar varnish has done a great job teach. Left bare naked, it would not be the golden honey color we see in your pic but a dark brown choclate inexplicable color only Bois D' Arc can offer.

I like the bright yellow color and would love to find a way to keep it that way even without the UV assault. For exterior use, i like that honey-golden brown color you have teach. Good job.

[getoverit]

I did some experimenting today with some blue wood dye I got from a luthier supply house. It gave an interesting result. In the picture below, you will see the raw wood on the left and the one with dye on the right.




I tried mixing the dye with lacquer thinner, but it was way too thin. I finally used it full strength (see the spot where it started) and then rubbed out with a paper towel.

I think I am going to get some black dye and also some brown dye to experiment with just to see how it looks.

[woodsteach]

Here is an osage orange post that has been outside for 2 years with marine spar varnish



here is an osage orange nightstand with 3 coats of polyurethane that is about 7 years old.

Front view



Side View  we used antler stubs for the feet of the nightstand.


Top View

(Hopefully the photos work I haven't posted pix in a long time.)
I really like osage orange.   I just have a hard time getting clear logs that aren't full of shake or rot. 
woodsteach