wrote in message
...
Similar to the thread topic, I am wondering what is advised for coating
a wood steering wheel?

I bought this off eBay and it is NOT one of the decorative wheels with
the brass hubs. this has a bronze hub that fits my Edson pedestal and
appears to be mahogany. It's quite weathered and I've stripped all the
remaining varnish off. (There wasn't much left anyway).

I have a sunbrella type cover for wheel/pedestal/compass so this will
not be left out in the elements when not in use.

What would be good coating options? I'm not looking for classic yacht
perfection. In fact I'm willing to trade perfection of finish off in
return for less effort in coating.

So far I have two suggestions:


1) Coat 2x with product from rotdoctor.com then 7-10 coats of varnish.
(the wheel is not rotted. But this fellow says the product is a great
sealer).


2) Use some sort of sealer or filler to even out surface, then coat 3-4x
with West epoxy.

Any thoughts or other ideas welcomed.


Charlie hasn't convinced you that Cetol is the way to go? He's going to be
disappointed.
For something like a wheel that is going to be handled a lot and maybe
banged into from time to time you may want to go with durability and I would
guess epoxy is the ticket. I think that rotdoctor stuff may just be a thin
type of epoxy that penetrates the wood. There was some discussion about
thinning epoxy on the list a while ago and I think you can use acetone but
denatured alcohol was better, up to 10%. A coat of thinned epoxy followed
by several coats of regular should do it. Don't know about UV inhibitors in
epoxy but it might be worth asking about as they would help preserve the
wood.