Staining Plywood for Dummies (Carpentry Week 7)

The last step in a woodworking or carpentry project is (usually) applying a finish, so it's fitting that the last dumbass of carpentry week is exposed for his lousy advice concerning the finishing step. This time, we caught Edwin Thomas exposing his incompetence on a Demand Media (aka eHow.com) website, SFGate Homeguides. Edwin's chosen topic is "How to Stain and Finish Plywood," a subject about which he apparently knows nothing (we guess they don't teach woodworking at American University).

We aren't really certain why the question is "stain and finish," since staining is a form of finishing, but Demand Media never changes questions except to correct spelling; and often doesn't even change that. But Thomas can't be bothered with such insignificant stuff, since he has misinformation to spread, misinformation such as:

"Smooth plywood is made with a more natural-looking wood veneer, disguising what the plywood really is, namely a heavily processed laminate made from glue and wood chips."  Bzzzzzzt! Plywood doesn't have a core of chips, Ed, it's formed by gluing together multiple thin layers (veneers) of wood. What this bozo seems to be talking about is that laminate stuff Ikea and Sauder use to make their furniture. There's more, though: his preparation process for finishing plywood is "Sand the wood veneer on the plywood with... mid-grit sandpaper, such as 100-grit... Wipe the veneer surface down with a tack cloth... Apply a solvent-based primer..."

Ummm, Eddie, 100-grit sandpaper isn't "mid-grit" (we think you meant "medium grit"), it's pretty darned coarse. If you're going to stain any wood, you continue using ever-finer sandpaper, working your tack cloth between different grades to pick up dust and stray particles of grit – all the way to about 320 grit. The sandpaper you say to stop with? It'll leave obvious scratches! 

And telling you to use a primer? You don't use a primer on plywood unless you're applying an opaque stain. Of course, you usually don't use opaque stain except on exterior projects -- though neither the question nor Thomas says word one about interior vs. exterior plywood. But wait, there's more:

"Do not use oil-based stains on plywood."

Yes, Edwin Thomas, expert that he is, says you should never use oil-based stain on plywood. We aren't certain where he came up with this bullshit, but it might be this 30-year-old article, which actually says to only use oil-based stains.

Should we name Edwin Thomas our Dumbass of the Day? We sure think so...

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DDIY - FINISHES