Quality finishes are very important in woodworking. A good finish can make poor woodworking product look good while a poor finish will make a good product look bad. That said, a good finish requires good preparations but the work itself is straight forward. Here is information explaining a little bit about wood finish for beginners.

Previously, preparing the wood for a coat of finish was a painstaking task. Nowadays, you can use a sander to do most of the work. In most cases, a random orbit sander or a finishing sander, also known as an orbital sander, is the best type of sander for this kind of work. If you need to remove a lot of stock, you may prefer to use a belt sander first and then a random orbit sander to create a smooth surface. Of course, you can also do the preparations manually but that will take much longer time. Generally, you first plane and then sand. Given how cheap good sanders are nowadays, it is well worth investing in a sander if you are going to do some sanding.

Often you want to use the traditional two-step finish, first stain the wood and then apply a clear protective finish. A coat of finish both enhances the look of the wood and protects it. Unfortunately, flaws can show through almost any finish. Even worse, often the finish will almost always magnify the flaws. So before applying a finish, you need to remove all flaws and blemishes. For small blemishes, wax or shellac sticks are the easiest solution. Larger blemishes can be concealed with wood filler. For larger flaws, you may need to create a patch, make a mortise and glue the patch into the mortise.

The easiest way to achieve a high-gloss finish is to use grain filler. Note that closed-grain woods have no need of grain filler. Grain filler can only be used on open-grain woods, such as ash, mahogany and oak. If you are going to stain the wood, it is easiest to apply filler before the stain.

Staining makes it possible to alter the outward appearance of the wood. Stains have often been used to make cheap wood look like expensive wood. Stains can be divided into two categories, those containing dyes and those with pigments.

Note that staining often produces uneven results. Even when you have applied a uniform coating of stain, the result can be uneven. This is because different parts of the same wood will absorb the liquid differently.

Bleaching is used to lighten the color of the wood. Bleaching can be used on its own for washing out the color of the wood. But it can also be used to prepare the wood for a specific stain. Bleaching can also be used to suppress the color difference between sapwood and heartwood.

Pickling or liming refers to a number of techniques used to give new wood the appearance of vintage antique. Although pickling can be applied to any wood, it works best with pine and oak.

Topcoat finish is used to protect the wood. The layer is very thin, often not thicker than a sheet of paper. Popular protective finishes are varnish, polyurethane and lacquer.