😕 Does anyone out there know of a way to stabilize the color of osage orange once it has been exposed to air?
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Osage Orange
- Thread starter tdrice
- Start date
- Joined
- Apr 13, 2006
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tdrice said:
there is very little that will settle the color of any of the yellow orange locust varieties but a good thick coat of epoxy seems to hold it the longest.
Two years ago I turned several items out of osage orange. The items I placed on shelves in the house have turned quite dark. The items I put in a drawer are still a pretty yellow. I know this is not much help, but it does show that to keep it's color osage orange needs to be protected from light.
UV light is the biggest problem for Osage Orange. The more UV light the wood gets the faster it goes to a nice brown. If you sand down just through the top layer, the wood is yellow again. Spar varnish has a UV protective coating in it. It works for awhile but just slows the process some. Turn the item - put a finish on it - put it in a dark part of the house (where you can still look at it and enjoy it) - and it will stay yellow longer. But if you look at the bottom of the item it will be much more yellow than the top part which is exposed to more UV light. Enjoy it for awhile and then enjoy the nice brown color it turns to.
Hugh
Hugh