Home › Varnishes › Varnishes (Dragon's blood with a paste)

Varnishes (Dragon's blood with a paste)

Dragon's blood with a paste composed of flowers of zinc, or, what is still better, a little red vermilion. Violet. the varnish is continually stirred till it is somewhat cool. Next day it is to be drawn off and filtered through cotton. By these means it will become exceedingly limpid.

The addition of glass may appear extraordinary; but this substance divides the parts of the mixture Cinnabar, mixed with lampblack, washed very which have been made with the dry ingredients; dry, or with the black of burnt vine-twigs; and to render it mellower, a proper mixture of red, blue, and white.

Pearl Gray.

White and black; white and blue; for example, ceruse and lampblack; ceruse and indigo.

Flaxen Gray.

Ceruse, which forms the ground of the paste, mixed with a small quantity of Cologne earth, as much English red, or carminated lake, which is not so durable, and a particle of Prussian blue.

Brunswick Black Varnish.

Melt 4 lbs. of common asphalt, and add 2 pts. of boiled linseed-oil, and 1 gall. of oil of turpentine or coal-tar naphtha.

India-Rubber Varnish.

Four ounces india-rubber in fine shavings are dissolved in a covered jar, by means of a sandbath, in 2 lbs. of crude benzole, and then mixed with 4 lbs. of hot linseed-oil varnish heated, and filtered. (See CEMENTS).

To make Varnish for Silks, etc.

To 1 qt. of cold linseed-oil poured off from the lees (produced on the addition of unslaked lime, on which the oil has stood 8 or 10 days at the least, in order to communicate a drying quality, or brown umber burnt and powdered, which will have the like effect,) add oz. of litharge; boil them for hour, then add oz. of the copal varnish. While the ingredients are on the fire, in a copper vessel, put in 1 oz. of chios turpentine or common resin, and a few drops of neat's-foot oil, and stir the whole with a knife; when cool it is ready for use. The neat's-foot oil prevents the varnish from being sticky or adhesive, and may be put into the linseed-oil at the same time with the lime or burnt umber. Resin or chios turpentine may be added till the varnish has attained the desired thickness.

The longer the raw linseed-oil remains on the unslaked lime or umber, the sooner will the oil dry after it is used; if some months, so much the beter. Such varnish will set, that is to say, not run, but keep its place on the silk in four hours; the silk may then be turned and varnished on the other side.

Compound Mastic Varnish.

Take of pure alcohol, 32 oz.; purified mastic, 6 oz.; gum sandarac, 3 oz.; very clear Venice turpentine, 3 oz.; glass, coarsely pounded, 4 oz.

Reduce the mastic and sandarac to fine powder; mix this powder with white glass, from which the finest parts have been separated by means of a hair-sieve; put all the ingredients with alcohol into a short-necked matrass, and adapt to it a stick of white-wood, rounded at the end, and of a length proportioned to the height of the matrass, that it may be put in motion. Expose the matrass in a vessel filled with water, made at first a little warm, and which must afterwards be maintained in a state of ebullition for 1 or 2 hours. The matrass may be made fast to a ring of straw.

When the solution seems to be sufficiently extended, add the turpentine, which must be kept separately in a phial or pot, and which must be melted by immersing it for a moment in a balneum mariæ. The matrass must be still left in the water for hour, at the end of which it is taken off, and and it retains the same quality when placed over the fire. It therefore obviates with success two inconveniences which are exceedingly troublesome to those who compose varnishes. In the first place, by dividing the matters, it facilitates the action of the alcohol; and in the second, its weight, which surpasses that of resins, prevents these resins from adhering to the bottom of the matrass, and also the coloration acquired by the varnish when a sand-bath is employed, as is commonly the case. The application of this varnish is suited to articles belonging to the toilet, such as dressingboxes, cut-paper works, etc. The following possess the same brilliancy and lustre, but they have more solidity, and are exceedingly drying.

Camphorated Mastic Varnish for Paintings.

Take of mastic, cleaned and washed, 12 oz; pure turpentine, 1½ oz.; camphor, oz.; white glass pounded, 5 oz.; essence of turpentine, 36 oz.

Make the varnish according to the method indicated for Compound Mastic Varnish. The camphor is employed in pieces, and the turpentine is added when the solution of the resin is completed.

But if the varnish is to be applied to old paintings, or paintings which have been already varnished, the turpentine may be suppressed; as this ingredient is here recommended only in cases of a first application to new paintings, and just freed from white-of-egg varnish.

The question by able masters respecting the kind of varnish proper to be employed for paintings, has never yet been determined. Some artists who have paid particular attention to this subject, make a mystery of the means they employ to obtain the desired effect. The real end may be accomplished by giving to the varnish destined for painting, pliability and softness, without being too solicitous in regard to what may add to its consistence or its solidity. The latter quality is particularly requisite in varnishes which are to be applied to articles much exposed to friction; such as boxes, furniture, etc.

Shaw's Mastic Varnish for Paintings.

Bruise the mastic with a muller on a painter's stone, which will detect the soft parts, or tears, which are to be taken out, and the remainder put into a clean bottle with good spirits of turpentine (twice distilled if you can get it); and dissolve the gum by shaking it in your hand for hour, without heat. When dissolved, strain it through a piece of calico and place it in a bottle well corked, so that the light of the sun can strike it, for 2 or 3 weeks; which will cause a mucilaginous precipitate, leaving the remainder as transparent as water. It may then be carefully decanted into another bottle and put by for use. The proportions of gum and alcohol are: mastic, 6 oz.; turpentine, 14 oz. If found on trial to be too thick, thin it with turpentine.

To make Painter's Cream.

Painters who have long intervals between their periods of labor, are accustomed to cover the parts they have painted with a preparation which preserves the freshness of the colors, and which they can remove when they resume their work.

This preparation is as follows:

Take of very clear nut-oil, 3.oz; mastic in tears, necessary, and occasion trouble and expense. pulverized, oz.; sal saturni, in powder (acetate | varnish, which render application to the varnisher of lead), & oz. Dissolve the mastic in oil over a gentle fire, and pour the mixture into a marble mortar, over the pounded salt of lead; stir it with a wooden pestle, and add water in small quantities till the matter assume the appearance and consistence of cream, and refuse to admit more water.

Sandarac Varnish.

Take of gum sandarac, 8 oz.; pounded mastic, 2 oz.; clear turpentine, 24 oz.; pounded glass, 4 oz.; pure alcohol, 32 oz. Mix and dissolve as before.

Compound Sandarac Varnish.

Take of pounded copal, of an amber color, once liquefied, 3 oz.; gum sandarac, 6 oz.; mastic, cleaned, 3 oz.; clear turpentine, 3½ oz.; pounded glass, 4 oz.; pure alcohol, 32 oz. Mix these ingredients, and pursue the same method as above. This varnish is destined for articles subject to friction; such as furniture, chairs, fan- sticks, mouldings, etc., and even metals; to which it may be applied with success. The sandarac gives it great durability.

Camphorated Sandarac Varnish for Cut-Paper Works, Dressing-Boxes, etc.

Take of gum sandarac, 6 oz.; gum elemi, 4 oz.; gum animi, 1 oz.; camphor, oz.; pounded glass, 4 oz.; pure alcohol, 32 oz.

Make the varnish according to the directions already given. The soft resins must be pounded with the dry bodies. The camphor is to be added in pieces.

Another. Take of gallipot or white incense, 6 oz.; gum animi, gum elemi, each 2 oz.; pounded glass, 4 oz.; alcohol, 32 oz.

Make the varnish with the precautions indicated for the compound mastic varnish.

The two last varnishes are to be used for ceilings and wainscots, colored or not colored. They may even be employed as a covering to parts painted with strong colors.

Spirituous Sandarac Varnish for Wainscoting small Articles of Furniture, Balustrades, Inside Railings. Take gum sandarac, 6 oz.; shell-lac, 2 oz.; colophonium or resin, white glass pounded, clear turpentine, each 4 oz.; pure alcohol, 32 oz. Dissolve the varnish according to the directions given for compound mastic varnish.

This varnish is sufficiently durable to be applied to articles destined to daily and continual use.

Varnishes composed with copal, ought however, in these cases to be preferred.

Another. There is another composition which, without forming part of the compound varnishes, is employed with success for giving a polish and lustre to furniture made of wood; wax forms the basis of it.

Many cabinet-makers are contented with waxing common furniture, such as tables, chests of drawers, etc. This covering, by means of repeated friction, soon acquires a polish and transparency which resembles those of varnish. Waxing seems to possess qualities peculiar to itself, but, like varnish, it is attended with inconveniences as well as advantages.

Varnish supplies better the part of glazing; it gives a lustre to the wood which it covers, and heightens the colors of that destined, in particular, for delicate articles. These real and valuable advantages are counterbalanced by its want of consistence; it yields too easily to the shrinking or swelling of the wood, and rises in scales or splits on being exposed to the slightest shock. These accidents can be repaired only by new strata of Waxing stands shocks, but it does not possess in the same degree as varnish the property of giving lustre to the bodies on which it is applied, and of heightening their tints. The lustre it communicates is dull, but this inconvenience is compensated by the facility with which any accident that may have altered its polish can be repaired by rubbing it with a piece of fine cork. There are some circumstances, therefore, under which the application of wax ought to be preferred to that of varnish. This seems to be the case in particular with tables of walnut-tree wood, exsmall articles subject to constant employment. posed to daily use, chairs, mouldings and for all But as it is of importance to make the stratum of wax as thin as possible in order that the veins of the wood may be more apparent, the following process will be acceptable to the reader :

Melt over a moderate fire in a very clean vessel 2 oz. of white or yellow wax, and when liquefied add 4 oz. of good essence of turpentine; stir the whole until it is entirely cool, and the result will be a kind of pomade fit for waxing furniture, and which must be rubbed over them according to the usual method. The essence of turpentine is soon dissipated, but the wax, which by its mixture is reduced to a state of very great division, may be extended with more ease and in a more uniform manner. The essence soon penetrates the pores of the wood, calls forth the color of it, causes the wax to adhere better, and the lustre which thence results is equal to that of varnish, without having any of its inconveniences.

Colored Varnish for Violins and other Stringed In.. struments, also for Plum-tree, Mahogany and Rose-wood.

Gum sandarac, 4 oz.; seed-lac, 2 oz.; mastic, Benjamin, in tears, each 1 oz.; pounded glass, 4 oz.; Venice turpentine, 2 oz.; pure alcohol, 32 oz.

The gum sandarac and lac render this varnish durable; it may be colored with a little saffron or dragon's blood.

French Polish.

The varnish being prepared (shellac), the article to be polished being finished off as smoothly as possible with glass-paper, and your rubber being prepared as directed below, proceed to the operation as follows: The varnish, in a narrownecked bottle, is to be applied to the middle of the flat face of the rubber, by laying the rubber on the mouth of the bottle and shaking up the varnish once, as by this means the rubber will imbibe the proper quantity to varnish a considerable extent of surface. The rubber is then to be enclosed in a soft linen cloth doubled, the rest of the cloth being gathered up at the back of the rubber to form a handle. Moisten the face of the linen with a little raw linseed-oil, applied with the finger to the middle of it. Placing your work opposite the light, pass your rubber quickly and lightly over its surface until the varnish becomes dry or nearly so; charge your rubber as before lightly over its surface until the varnish becomes with varnish (omitting the oil), and repeat the rubbing until three coats are laid on, when a little oil may be applied to the rubber and two coats more given to it. Proceeding in this way until the varnish has acquired some thickness, wet the inside of the linen cloth, before applying the varnish, with alcohol, and rub quickly, lightly and uniformly the whole surface. Lastly, wet the linen cloth with a little oil and alcohol without varnish, and rub as before till dry.

To make the Rubber.

Roll up a strip of thick woolen cloth which has