# refinish on thin veneer



## nephro38 (Aug 20, 2013)

I have a cabinet that Im restoring and have stripped its existing finish with acetone as I saw the veneer was pretty thin. The veneer itself is in pretty good shape. Will just refinish with danish or teak oil. 

Because of the thinness of the veneer, any advice on prep-work before oil finish? I figure the veneer was factory sanded so I was going to just oil it up without sanding. But everywhere I read they say sand before oiling. Does this still hold true if the veneer is in good shape? Also if the overall consensus is to sand, what grit should I start with considering how thin the veneer is?


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## cabinetman (Jul 5, 2007)

nephro38 said:


> Will just refinish with danish or teak oil.


Exactly which Danish or Teak oil are you considering? Do you have brand names?


















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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

If you used acetone to strip the finish there should be very little sanding needed. Unless the veneer looks transparent you should be able to sand it with 220 grit sandpaper without any problem. The wood does need a little sanding because you never get 100% of the old finish off and sanding it will get the rest.


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## nephro38 (Aug 20, 2013)

Thx for the responses. To answer questions
1) danish or teak oil brand....was going to use watco. I understand they are not true oils from other posts on the board. 
2) in re to sanding, if yes as indicated by poster steve, all im looking to do then is "scuffing it up" so that there is only a fine powder of wood dust?


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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

nephro38 said:


> Thx for the responses. To answer questions
> 1) danish or teak oil brand....was going to use watco. I understand they are not true oils from other posts on the board.
> 2) in re to sanding, if yes as indicated by poster steve, all im looking to do then is "scuffing it up" so that there is only a fine powder of wood dust?


 The Watco oil finish and tung oil finishes that are an oil/varnish mixture are a good finish for a lot of applications. They are just not good for something like a table where exposure to water is present. For a cabinet any of them would work fine.

I haven't seen the piece but from your description if you stripped the finish off to where visually you can't see any more then only the tiniest residue will be left on the surface so it wouldn't take much sanding to finish cleaning it up. Otherwise the tiny residue might prevent the oil finish from properly penetrating into the wood. It sounds like hand sanding would be enough.


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