How to use wood conditioner before staining. If you use the conditioner after staining it will lift the stain you already have down. What it does is open the pores of the wood to allow it to take the stain evenly and deeply. All you need to do is figure out which woods are likely to benefit and i can tell you that. Before staining apply minwax pre stain wood conditioner on clean raw wood using a brush or cloth.
Buy water based wood conditioner. The sooner you stain after applying the conditioner the less blotching you may want to apply two applications of the conditioner to end grain. Finally using a pre stain wood conditioner will likely lighten the color of your stain to some degree since the role of the conditioner is to slightly hinder the absorption of the stain. While some companies manufacture wood conditioner with a large concentration of solvents this may be too complicated to mix yourself.
Be sure to test the stain on an inconspicuous spot on the project before starting. Continue below to find out if you should use it on your project. The technique of wetting the wood down before staining is called popping the grain. Allow to penetrate for 5 to 15 minutes then remove any excess with clean dry cloth.
Wood conditioner is used to partially seal the grain of porous wood. Instead you can make your own pre stain wood conditioner by thinning a solvent based finish. Simply put wood conditioner is a far less risky alternative and the companies themselves clue you in to which types of stains may need it by marketing it together with those particular stains. I also perform a small test on a scrap piece of wood so you can see the difference a conditioner makes.
No you only use the conditioner before the first application of stain. Commercial wood conditionerpre stain conditioners are merely proprietary products designed to partially seal the wood. Using a spitcoat or highly thinned layer of shellac. Apply stain within two hours of application of pre stain wood conditioner.