[A. G. Maisey]

I agree with you Rick.

French polish is only the application of a number of coats of shellac, the right way is to do it is with a rubber all the way, but it can be short cut by using a brush first and then finishing with a rubber.

However, for somebody who has never used shellac before, either brushed or used as french polish, it is not really all that easy to get a decent job. That's where Danish oil comes in:- its quick, its easy, with minimum care it gives a very good job, and used the way I've explained, the final appearance is just like a well preserved old wrongko.

No dispute at all that shellac is the best finish, but for a beginner it is not the easiest finish, not by a long shot.

Danish Oil and Scandinavian Oil are similar, and depending on the brand you can get different mixes in the ingredients. Some of these oils have a urethane component, some don't. I actually dislike urethanes, even for floors, on a floor I prefer tung oil, but it is virtually impossible today to get genuine tung oil, the stuff they sell as tung oil has urethanes in it, its just that it behaves like tung oil and looks like tung oil when it dries. Straight urethane I would never use for anything, but where these wood finishing products are concerned, although they might have urethane in them, they behave like a very quick drying oil, and the finish is nothing at all like any urethane that I've ever seen.

Another oil I used to use a lot was Birchwood Casey Stock Oil, it gave a really beautiful finish that looked for all the world like a top London gun finish. It dropped off the market here is Oz for a few years, and I never used it again after it became available again, mostly because I'd pretty much stopped doing high class rifle stocks by the time it appeared again. The couple of expensive stocks I did after that I did with linseed.