The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop New '35 cab wood treatment?

I've finished fabricating a few of the many structural wood parts for my '35 Chev. 1 1/2 ton truck. I'm wondering what preservating/finish I should use before final assembly of the painted steel body parts. The main door-post uprights and the front roof piece are new oak. Much of the rest is old-growth straight grain fir. Any advice is much appreciated.

John Larson

I would think you would want to seal your wood pieces with some type of wood preservative to seal them against moisture and humidity. Make sure to seal the end grain especially.

There is a product called wood hardener used for dry rot. Now it is in no way linked to Viagra, but it makes dry rot stop and sprays on. Plumers use it in bathroom remodles. I don't have an old bathroom but if you get back to me in a couple of years I'll let you know how the inlaws bath room does. Best of all you can finish over it.

Step on over to your local marine supplier. They have all kinds of wonderful expensive products for wonderful expensive boats. They WILL have what you need. Or you can just get some spar varnish from Home Depot and pocket the change.

with the weather you have in Hoquiam, you should use a solvent based preservative. There is a product called "Sun Frog" that I have used on really porous woods (cedar and fir) and had really good luck with. But you can't paint over it very well as the paint falls off and wont stick.

The wood on my '35 is painted black with a tarry oil type preservative everywhere except the door jambs which are painted body color. It was painted in 1960 and is still in great condition - nearly all the wood is original. The truck has not been outside in the weather for about 40 years except to drive it.

Ken

Thanks for all the advice and suggestions. I'm not planning to paint over any wood as the new pieces I'm using are just too nice looking to cover over. Therefore, whatever wood treatment I wind up using should not adversly alter the look of the natural wood. How does the "sun frog" stuff look on its own? I suppose a marine supply store is a good first stop to see what's out there. I was just curious what others have done in this area of restoration (actually, I'd be curious to know what was done back in the factory when these things were being pieced together new -- anyone know?).

Sunfrog looks great on it's own - it adds a slight reddish / yellow tint to it. It is not a sealer, but rather it soaks into the wood like an oil and is water resistant. I did my entire shop with it - all the boards were soaked in a 14 foot long trough and then drip-dried for a week before I put them up.