Woodstain over woodstain -too dark

[Dickieboy]

A few years ago we purchased a house where all the external woodwork was nicely painted in Dulux Deep Mahogany woodstain. Every couple of years we rubbed down the woodwork and applied another coat of Deep Mahogany.

Recently we then overcoated some of the woodwork with the lightest woodstain we could find (Pine) as we found the woodwork was getting too dark with repeated coats of Deep Mahogany.

Unfortunately, the Pine woodstain is giving an unpleasant brownish ting which we don't like. All work has now stopped pending a solution to our colour dilemna!

I could not face stripping all the woodwork back to bare wood and starting again. Is it possible to get a colourless woodstain -or is that varnish? Could we just use varnish over the top of the woodstain to preserve the deep mahogany colour? Any other ideas?

Many thanks for any help you can give.

Richard

 

[Robbie uk]

The thing is with stain that every coat takes it darker. Some of the stains tend to work thicker than others and will take it darker quicker. In the past i have used "deal" to overcoat darker woodwork to try and stop it working darker. Sikkens THB in Deal is quite good because it works thinner but is a quality stain, might not be too bad. Others i'm sure will have different remedies.

 

[whitespirit]

Yes you could varnish and it will give a nice effect preserving what is underneath. I would very lightly rub down first BUT make sure you do not remove any previous coating of the dark stain down to bear wood...easily done if you sand too aggressively...then you will be left with light patches in the dark wood! There are plenty of clear varnishes so it depends whether you want a gloss or matt finish. Exterior varnish should last for years providing your wood underneath is in good order- sound and dry and not flaking.