Wood brushing: selection of brushes and tools, DIY woodworking

Recommendation points

• Which tree to use
• Brushes and other tools
• Work order
• Features of working with floor coverings
• Processing, painting, patina

For a real master, the ability to age wooden decor with his own hands should not be a problem, especially since this technique is used quite often. We described the technique for performing the work for you and compiled a list of tools for brushing wooden products with our own hands..

Which tree to use

The essence of brushing is a brighter manifestation of the texture of wood, its natural pattern. This is achieved by creating a relief surface from which soft fibers are removed, but hard ones, on the contrary, remain. Hence the first obvious truth: fibers of different densities in wood should be.

Therefore, rocks with a uniform dense structure, such as maple, beech, alder or teak, are not suitable for brushing. But this does not mean that hard wood cannot be aged by brushing. For example, when processing oak boards, a very interesting effect is achieved: the appearance of thin ragged scratches, which, if properly stained, makes such products a very valuable decor.

Conifers look their best after brushing. The most common pine has a poor texture, and the drawing after processing is unlikely to surprise anyone. But in spruce and larch, truly unique patterns appear..

Any tree for brushing must be qualitatively planed and free of any kind of defects and defects, brushing will not eliminate them. The moisture content of the wood, ideally, should be 10-12%, but in any case no more than 15%, otherwise the fibers will break and abundantly form fine pile.

Brushes and other tools

The main work during brushing is carried out with brushes. These are quite rough metal disc-type brushes with brass or steel bristles. It is desirable that the brush has a wide end part and is close in shape to the roller – this way the treatment will be more uniform. The thickness of the wire depends entirely on the type of wood: the pile should be 7-10 times thinner than soft veins, while straight wires are preferable to “curly”.

The brushes choose the bulk of the fibers, but the surface remains too rough and fleecy. The quality of processing can be improved by using synthetic nylon brushes, in which abrasive powder of different fractions is fused into the thickness of the plastic. Such sanding helps to eliminate most of the small scuffs and pile that interfere with painting, without them the surface looks cleaner and more pleasant.

The third stage is usually avoided, but if you want a premium surface finish, the brushed wood will need to be polished. Due to the presence of pores, this is not easy to do, you must use brushes with a hard natural bristle, for example, sisal or coarse wool.

Good workmanship is usually achieved with a power tool. A drill will be preferable to an angle grinder, working with it, it is easier to control the direction of roughing and turns. Careful fixation of the workpiece is also necessary; a pair of clamps is useful. And, of course, you will need protective equipment against dust, which is formed more than abundantly, and its removal: a vacuum cleaner, glasses and gloves will definitely not be superfluous.

Work order

At the first stage of processing, the dry and clean surface of the wood is bypassed with a rough brush, tearing out soft layers to the desired depth. It would be most reasonable to orient the face surfaces of the parts across the layers of fibers, where there are many veins and they are thin. But do not forget that all visible planes must be processed, otherwise the contrast will be too conspicuous..

You need to move the brush strictly along the fibers without strong pressure. Small irregularities on the plane will inevitably remain, this is the main disadvantage (or advantage) of manual wood processing. The number of revolutions is 1500-2200, although this value may differ for different breeds.

The main nice feature of brushing is that it opens up a wide field for experimentation and can be used with a deviation from the basic rules if the purpose of visual design requires it. For example, tearing wood across the grain leaves a messy pattern of rough scratches, which can be useful for rare decorative inserts..

After brushing the wood, it is time to sand. A synthetic abrasive brush is guided along the fibers until all roughness visible to the naked eye is eliminated. From time to time, the workpiece needs to be tapped from the back in order to remove accumulated dust from the pores and to evaluate the quality of processing. After removing the lint and scuffs, it is time to polish to give the relief smoothness and slight glossiness. This can be done either with a brush on a drill or by hand using the hard part of a kitchen sponge..

Features of working with floor coverings

Not only furniture elements, platbands and all kinds of decors can be brushed. This treatment technique is often used to simulate aging of parquet and parquet boards..

The main difficulty in working with a wooden floor is the large amount of work. The drill is of little use here: the uniformity of processing and productivity suffer. At such volumes, it is reasonable to purchase or borrow a brush grinder. It will allow you to adhere to a uniform “scratch-out” depth of the brush, and then quickly carry out sanding over a large area.

It is not recommended to show deep wood relief for the floor, otherwise the coating will get very dirty and poorly washed. The optimum depth is 0.5–0.8 mm, so the wood on the floor will become warm and pleasantly rough, the unnatural gloss will disappear.

Processing, painting, patina

Billing the tree is only half the battle. Brushing sets the final goal of the visual highlighting of the wood texture, most often for this purpose they are painted with special techniques.

You need to make sure that the fiber sampling is done well and the surface is ready for painting. For this, water-based stains are used with the effect of light tanning or moxibustion. Application should be carried out with a brush, rubbing carefully along the fibers and observing in the process of raising the fine villi. If such are present, the surface must be thoroughly dried and again easily brushed with a sanding brush, breaking off dried and hardened burrs..

Instead of a brush, it is convenient to use a soft sponge – the paint is distributed more evenly and without excess

When painting, most often the arrangement of tones repeats the play of light and shadow on irregularities: the depressions are painted in a dark color, the ridges – in a light one. To do this, the surface is first opened with a rich dark varnish, and then wiped with a sponge or rag, removing the remaining varnish from hard fibers, where it does not have time to absorb..

When working on a large surface, uniform coloration is achieved after the dark dye has completely dried and then lightly processed with a flap disc with a grit size of P400-800. When the bulges are lightened, they are opened with colorless or light-colored parquet varnish.

Another color option offers an inversion: the upper tier of the relief is planned to be dark, and the depressions are painted in a light tone. In this case, the surface is first tinted with a dark polyurethane varnish and dried. This is followed by the application of a light opaque composition, the excess of which is removed with a rubber spatula to develop a dark substrate on the ridges.