Generally I finish my frames with Watco danish oil, not because it has any special marine properties but just because it’s relatively inexpensive, it penetrates well, and it dries quickly. In any project where you can’t paint all the surfaces you don’t want a hard encapsulation because water is just going to get behind it and underneath it, reducing, not increasing, the overall lifespan.
For this latest frame I decided to try Corey’s pine tar boat sauce available at skinboats.com. Less toxic than petroleum based finishes, this updated version of a traditional recipe that swaps out limonene for turpentine. I’ve used this in the past but forgot why I decided it wasn’t a great idea, so I decided to give it another try.
Putting it on was about twice as hard because it’s very thick and won’t bleed into any area that you don’t paint it on. This is the big downside of this product because there’s no possibility that it’s penetrating into the rib to stringer joints. Fortunately this doesn’t actually matter because White oak and western red cedar are extremely rot resistant, but it could be a problem in a frame made out of ash and pine.
Wiping it off was about four times as hard and I was scrubbing furiously for about an hour to try to get the frame dry.
On the positive side, it dries faster than I thought it would and it doesn’t leave that dead brown look that I get with the Watco (although in my experience all finishes that look like that are much more UV resistant) I can tell that at least on the parts that I could get coated it’s a much more durable finish. The pores of the wood are filled to the point where it almost has a satin look.
The citrus/pine tar smell coming off it is very strong strong but supposedly not toxic. I like it, but for Liz its a migraine trigger.
Would I do it again? I might try thinning it even more with limonene and giving it another chance.
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