While gel stain does go on thick and sit on the surface of the wood i found that you can still see and feel the natural wood grain beneath unlike paint.
Gel stain over a varnished wooden garage door.
Paint with acrylic latex.
I shared the makeover of a mid century modern credenza last week where i used general finishes gel stain over the existing finish on the piece and wanted to share how i did that.
We ve lived in our home almost 7 years now.
With water based varnishes re application on outdoor surfaces is a fact of life.
Apply a thin even coat of gel stain to a section using a natural bristle brush or a soft lint free cloth.
Apply the gel stain wait about 10 minutes and wipe to remove the extra stain.
We stained the doors hanging this made it much easier as we could finish both sides without having to wait for the opposite side to dry.
Our gel stained garage door makeover happened one year ago so i m giving you guys an update.
Sand with 150 grit paper.
Apply downward pressure while moving the graining tool across the section at a constant speed.
Prime with tinted primer.
Sometimes that is necessary but if you have a piece without much of a topcoat sealer poly etc.
I think one misconception is that you have to strip and sand a piece down to bare wood before you can re stain it.
The great thing about using a gel stain is it will sit on a vertical surface without dripping.
Affiliate links included for your convenience we used a less than 20 can of gel stain to transform our paint faded aluminum garage door.
When brushing work on each section of the door at a time and try to mimic the direction of natural wood grain.
At the end of the re application my door was as good as new.
Apply in the direction of the grain you intend to create.
Gel stain usually dries very quickly especially on a sunny day.
With the oak cabinets the grain was very evident post staining.
Spread on spackling compound.
We ve been dreaming up garage door makeover ideas since we first purchased our home and though we ve been making over just about every square inch of our house our garage door was working and in great condition.
Gel stain will not require you to sand the product to a raw wood finish.
Painting over stain steps.
The gel stain is thick like pudding not a liquid.
If you have ugly stained and varnished doors and trim and you d like to paint the whole works here s the best way to get a good looking result.
However the garage door will need to sit for up to 48 hours to allow the stain to dry completely.
Stain over paint or existing stain without having to strip your old finish.
Or you can follow the direction of the garage door pattern.
While the gel stain is wet use a graining tool to create a wood grain pattern.
Since we moved into our home our brown painted aluminum garage door had faded more and more.
So i did a minor touch up by re sanding the door applying the stain where needed then applying new coats of varnish.
You need to work in small areas.