I had been thinking about how I could make tonewoods for instruments paler, white, or pearlescent white without doing a UV bleaching process. It had been knocking around my head for a while when I finally sat down and searched for ways to do it, and wouldn't you know, Tamar already did a video about it. In my head, I went "Yes!" Because I knew that in 20 minutes time my questions would be answered, because your videos are always perfect in my opinion. Especially how set out with your best attempt at being comprehensive (and do a great job of it), then encounter one or two problems or oversights, and then explain them honestly and kind of, call yourself out on them if that makes sense? This is one of the most refreshing, valuable and rare tendencies in people who make videos. Those are some of the most valuable learning moments, I love them. The fact that 99% of folks edit out all of their mistakes and just smile, means that thousands of their audience members will go ahead and make the mistakes that were edited out and then feel like fools for making them. It also changes the feel of a video a lot too, changing things from a top down teacher/student lecture dynamic, to more of a friendly coworker dynamic. Like "Hey, I did this project, some stuff worked, some didn't, I didn't anticipate this problem, so watch out when you're doing yours". I feel like your videos save me lots of making mistakes and feeling frustrated with myself because I was lucky enough to have gotten a heads up from you. I really appreciate it. You do really fantastic work.

A little note about RED oak and WHITE oak, both red and white oak can look identical. Some red oak is actually white in color, and some white oak is actually red in color. The big difference between red oak and white oak is the grain. Red oak has open grain, and white oak has tiny closed grain; therefore the reason white oak generally lasts much longer in the natural elements. And a note on sanding wood that is to be stained, if you sand with no finer than 180 grit the wood will accept the stain more readily. Experiment for yourself with sanding wood blanks. Try staining wood sanded in 120, 180, 220, and 400 grit paper. You may be quite surprised by the outcome. 😃

Absolutely great video, it’s projects like this that become real research tools for us cabinet makers, thanks for all the effort!

Interesting findings. As a chemist, I recommend anyone doing these processes to wear goggles, gloves, and labcoat(tyvek from big box store may work) in a well ventilated area. Lye and hydrogen peroxide are corrosive and caustic. For more accurate information on safety, read the specifications or look up the material safety data sheet for the chemical online.

I am 100% impressed and grateful for this video! I’m interested in bleaching my great grandmothers maple table and I desperately needed to know! Thank you so much!

this was so thorough! I loved seeing the different bleaching and finishes

Hi Tamar! Thanks for another wonderful video!...I was once told by a professional cabinet maker that you can obtain cherry-like results using popular. I think you have made the connection by bleaching out the green tint so common in poplar leaving some lovely grain features! Thank you!

What a great and thorough video! Thanks for all of your hard work and thorough notes! I feel like I just watched an interesting science experiment!

I love your style: doing a lot of research and testing before fully committing to a project. Improvising is for quick problem solving, not for starting the work. You deserve (at least) five stars for dedication.

I was looking for this information a couple of years ago. This is the most comprehensive set of tests I've seen. Thanks very much.

Than you, so much, Sister! I'm currently rehabilitating my 1954 red oak flooring, and I was pleasantly surprised to find you, with this :) Appreciate you.

A great demonstration to help us understand the various options and results. Thanks for your diligence!

Thank you for sharing the experiment. I am new to wood working and am trying to get an idea of different finishes and how to apply them to different projects. This one was fun to watch.

Thanks for sharing, awesome demonstration of the use of different products and the effects on different wood

Wow! What a lot of work and a ton of great results. Thanks for sharing.

I recently did shou sugi ban on some white pine. After wire brushing off the ash, I applied a white wood stain and then wiped off the excess. Really great effect. The wood is white from the stain, but the darkened wood grain from the shou sugi ban burn shows through. I was really please with the outcome. This video is a little different than that, but I thought it relates. Love your content! Keep it up!

Tamar, love this tutorial. The show and tell was amazing. The variety of the sample woods is outstanding. You've helped alot of us showing the before and Afters of each type of wood. Keep up the good work and I'll keep watching all your videos. 👍🏻🇺🇸

Best video related to this topic I have seen. This was super useful. I'm so glad you shared. Thank you!

Loved your scientific approach to showing multiple methods, products& materials and labeling the methods on tape. Only cons I have are talked Thur results a little fast for me and wished you had included a knotty pine material. Great job!

You started bleaching walnut and my inner soundtrack was playing Sheryl Crow “ if it makes you happy, it can’t be that bad” 😉✌️

Can I “double 👍🏼 “ this video? I hate to think how long it took you to create this video but it has been incredibly helpful to me on multiple occasions and I am not a woodworker or a carpenter by any stretch of the imagination. I’m doing creative projects around my own home and clients homes. I’ve returned to watch your wood bleaching experiment time and time again. Love that it’s so thorough, informative and entertaining! Thank you!

I've never bleached wood before and really appreciate the information on how to. thank you for your time

Looking forward to the table you're going to make using the bleaching technique! Thanks for all your hard work in comparing the different methods. I do testing but wouldn't have the patience to go that far. I was holding my breath as you were using those bleaching techniques wearing nice dark colored tops and jacket. No doubt I would have gotten bleached spots on them!

Thank you for such a super thorough and great video!! I was worried you had forgotten about ash in your summary of the two-part bleaches @20 but so glad you do mention it around @24:23. It does look great and is what I was hoping to find as a begin a project in ash for which I want a very clean bright white-ish ash. So, again, well done and thank you!

That was a lot of work! Thank you for your time and effort it’s greatly appreciated. 👍

Very helpful. You video gave me the idea to experiment with both a 2 component bleach and oxalic acid to remove the green tint coated with a clear shellac or rice wax finish. Thanks for the inspiration.

Very cool and in-depth test and analysis - thanks!

Cheers! Was looking how to make maple bone white. Neat comprehensive overview of finishes.

Great effort! You went the extra mile on this one, thanks! Sanding can impact absorption as well. Stopping at 180 grit can yield some interesting differences.

Super comparisons! You've helped me a ton. I know this took a lot of time to assemble

I often use oxalic acid to clean timber decks. I only ever wash it off with water. Takes the ‘silvering’ off hardwood back towards the original colour. Love your work 👍

Wow. What a super interesting test. Thank you so much for doing this. Great job!

One of your best uploads. Thank you for all the effort.

Thank you for the video! I will keep you posted on how it turns out😃

I absolutely love it! Great process, and it didn't take a ton of time and money to provide empirical answers before potentially ruining a large project. I've been plagued by delays in making decisions for fear of damaging a project. Having hands-on data helps a ton with that anxiety.

Awesome video Tamar! I really like what you found with the poplar. Now I can make some nice hardwood projects with one of the cheapest hardwoods and not worry about the ugly green hues. It looks so good! I really appreciate all the effort to put this together, super helpful!

You put a lot of effort in this video and did a very good job explaining. Thank you

So cool to watch these experiments. Thanks for sharing!

Thanks for spending the money to do all that. I love videos like this. They help narrow down the options, which saves us viewers lots of money and unused product! Much appreciated!

Thank you SO MUCH for doing the work! I have a decision to make on 75 cabinet doors and a dozen interior doors. This was so helpful! 🙏

Another awesome video, with tons of useful info. I'm adding this vid to my "Excellent Tutorials" playlist. Thanks so much for all your detailed work, and your excellent presentation. Thumbs way up!

Thankyou for making this. Your well thought out testing method made me quite happy :)

I do a lot of custom veneer work for concept vehicles. I've had very good luck thinning down regular white automotive tint with lacquer thinner. Thin it down quite a bit and spray many light coats, being patient, allowing it to dry between coats until desired finish is obtained. Be careful not to coat too heavy or it'll get blotchy. Only catch is, you have to spray it with a normal auto paint sprayer. It'll turn white, leaving the tonal details visible.

I’ve bleached a lot of floors and always hated the process and smells, loved the video thou!!

Some of those finishes are pretty cool, even if that's not what you're looking for. Thanks for doing this. Gives us references without having to do the testing.

Adding the kerf lines - masterstroke. Only you would take the time and trouble to do that. Chapeau, Tamar.

Love the big experiment. I have bleached a bunch of maple and ash. If you really want to go for a super white finish you need to put on way more bleach and let it self dry overnight, then repeat that 2 and possible 3 times. It's really a cool transformation. Then apply Briwax brand liming wax. Liming wax is the only finish I use. Nothing else. Turns out really cool. Love your channel. No matter how much I think I know, I always learn something new.

I’ve used ~70% bleach to water to bleach teak yacht decks. We just applied it with a stiff bristle deck brush and rinsed with fresh water after about 20 minutes. It gives a clean light look. Scrubbing it in with the brush gets it into the grain and helps keep the color even.

Really fantastic work and a whole bunch of excellent information. Thanks!

Thanks for the video. It'll be a good reference in the future. I have a lot of wood swatches laying around my shop with different finishes; glad I don't need to make a dozen more for bleaching.

Hi, thanks for this. This is exactly the reason I first signed up for KZfaq. A well put together video that saves me having to reinvent the wheel. I’m looking to get a driftwood finish and whilst this isn’t exactly the same it definitely gives me a great starting point. KZfaq only allows me to give one thumbs up so have a few more 👍👍👍👍👍.

Great video! I will certainly try the 2 part bleach on my next maple project!

Thank you for doing this very thorough comparison. I recently made a chair for a customer who wanted a distressed beachy look so I experimented a little. The chair was red oak and beech and the product I used was from Zinsser (I have no affiliation) which was a 2 part process as well that I applied one at a time. I was astonished how bleached each species became. The red oak was coming off in my foam brush while applying to the point the liquid took on the red/brown tone in seconds. In the end the client chose an unbleached distressed white paint wiped off look but I was very impressed by the Zinsser product Keep up the amazing work Tamar, I finish my portable workbench in a day or two 😎

Brilliant video! The timing of this video could not be more perfect for me: I'm just about to white-wash/stain and poly finish the first piece of furniture I've made. I'm using Mango wood and white stain + water polyurethane and have already made several samples. I think I might have to try a couple of samples of Osmo + Homebrew bleach - the Mango wood has white, grey, yellow, orange and brown tones so the results should be interesting! Thanks again for the detailed break down!

Def gained a new follower! Im trying to figure out a solution for a customer and this was mega helpful and in all a great watch! Also thankful i have some dalys in the shop! Now i just have to figure which rubio will go a top of bleached nogol! Thanks for doing the legwork👊

Great video, thanks for sharing your experience. Heads up on Sodium Hydroxide… it can dissolve glass when heated. It needs to be a high concentration and the temp needs to be pretty high but I’d always use plastic when mixing and/or storing JIC. Hope to see the big project that comes from this experiment in the future.

Thank you again for your hard work! This is exceedingly useful information.

Interesting results!!! I build a kids bed a few years back and the desired em finish was whitewash…. I ended up using regular emulsion but applied it with a cotton rag. Rubbing into to wood. Was so quick and easy and dries really really fast. Can just build up to desired look with multiple coats

I love this video. I've had a problem with some woods (I favor maple) and your examples help. Thank you!

Very cool! Thanks for sharing your research. Gotta love a good bunch of material samples.

You did think and were correct in thinking the ash or maple would be your favorite for a bleached wood look. As an aside a client once called me after using a paint stripper called Peel Away on the walnut trim in their 1890’s townhouse. The stripper turned the walnut so dark it appeared black and after reading the Peel Away label it said “Do Not Use On Walnut” I didn’t know if I could save their trim or would have to replace it at considerable cost. I tried Bleach, Oxalic, and the two part bleach in a test area and to my surprise and the clients relief the two part bleach brought back that rich brown walnut color. Disaster averted and client learned the importance of reading the full label.

Excellent video. I am finding, as I work on some projects, I need to do testing on each type of wood I use. And this includes fillers, and stains, and how they interact, etc. I bought a precut Tele guitar body, and now I wish I had just purchased a blank, so I would have had scrap to test how I want to finish it.

Thanks for all the effort! I had a piece of furniture a long time ago that was a white washed maple. Kinda messed around with some of these methods (except the osmo.) Found a pretty pleasing result by just using a liming wax at the very end. Looks pretty good on red oak as well.

For everyone: Whether its an acid or a base Tamar is right, add it in batches and add the chemical to the water. If you can't remember: "Acid to watta like you oughtta" :)

I love experiments with organized results!

Great informative video👍👍. I am wanting to bleach teak so would have loved to see that too.

BTW, I'm so impressed that you were able to catalog and speak to each method and the results of each as you compared them. I'm not sure I would have been able to keep it all straight! 👍🏻🇺🇸

Brilliant video and so informative. Thanks very much!

I know its an older video, but I just need to share two things. 1) Thank you for this video! Love being able to see real life tests! 2) Forgive me. As a former chem teacher just wanted to pass along that safety glasses are nice, but if you are handling chemicals you might want to get your self a pair of splash proof goggles and a labcoat. I can type and see this and your vids today thanks to wearing splash proofs in college. A rather large explosion of chemicals got me in the face and body. I have a tiny scar and my sight. The only thing I was out of? the clothing I was wearing took about 100 pinhole sized splashes of chemical that I didn't know were there until I took the clothing out of the wash. Burn marks and holes everywhere. Not that they were all that nice of clothing, but I could have saved them with a labcoat. This has been my Ted talk. :)

Wow, Tamar! I know that project was an investment of time and effort, but what amazing, interesting results! Definitely a quality resource for out-of-the-box-thinking woodworkers.

This is a GREAT video! I am loving the comparisons of the finishes, and seeing how much colour they would add. (In the end, I just like the osmo hard wax the best, even though it changes the colour.) thanks!

Thank you for doing this experiment. Relevant to an upcoming project. 👍

This is awesome, great work and thank you for all the information!

Really useful 'experiment' and will save me having to repeat something similar. Thanks for this👍👍

your idea to mix the bleached walnut with regular so the grain matches and homogenous piece is great idea. I may do it in future project bleaching alongside ebonising it, I've done the latter on walnut and other tannin heavy woods before (with ferric acetate) but not tried bleaching.

Another great comparison test Tamar! Bleaching is such a great finish to be able to do but it always requires a lot of pretesting. Your video provides a lot of interesting data as a starting point. I also like the Osmo products but found they too take a lot of pre testing, especially the Wood Wax stain, in order to see consistent results.

Lots of work. Whew! Thank you!!

So helpful. Thank you Tamar.

loved that video . I use straight bleach it seems to work for me I have used it on several types of wood seemed to work best on mahogany (honduras) then wash dry and spar varnish

What a lot of work. Thank you.

This was sooooo useful! I've always avoided poplar because of all the colors - greens and purples - but oxalic acid will make it a viable choice in some of my projects. Thanks for providing a comprehensive review of techniques.

I appreciate the scientific measurement plan. It's very helpful and cost effective to your audience.

Just a couple of things about your experiments. Oxalic acid is, in the UK a notifiable poison and in its granular form is easily mistaken for sugar though smells faintly of sulphur, also when dry sanding after always make sure the Oxalic is well wiped down or you will choke. The Lye, Peroxide can burn very badly so if you get it on your skin plenty of clean water to irrigate the area. A mix I use sometimes when I don’t want a huge colour change is using Sodium Carbonate and Oxalic. Often when I chemical strip pieces I’ll sometimes wash with soda which does bleed the tannins so the Oxalic reverts this back and cleans the timber as well. The reason for applying the lye / peroxide separately is to allow the lye to bleed the tannins more effectively. It’s surprising just how timber reacts long term to bleaching the tannins seem to surface again, certainly when working on fumed or baked timbers like Oak. I’ve been a French Polisher for 44 years

Excellent test and presentation. Saved me tons of effort and frustration.

Excellent, thorough comparison. Thanks

Neat video, liked your thought with the Walnut.

Thanks for the very informative video. A short summery PDF with pics would make a great reference doc.

very informative Tamar. thanks for sharing this video.

What a mission! Thank you for doing this!

Excellent excellent! Well done video! Thank you!!

Great video. Super in depth and surprising. I could have used this info years ago. Those test samples could be an art project! Mahalo for sharing! : )

I always enjoy your experiments!

Wow that was a lot of work for you and very helpful for me! Thank you! I have a lot of read oak I want to build some modern style tables with and looking for finish ideas. If you could post some high resolution still photos of your results it would be much appreciated!

Very cool. All your videos are fascinating.

I will have to remember the trick with the acid and poplar. I like using poplar (both cost and ease of working with it), but I am not a fan of the green. Thanks for all your work and clear explanations!

Nice job! I am now going to try OSMO sometime

Well felt like I was back in woodshop class with this one... that was like 100 years ago. I do like the method to your madness... ill be using the osmo on my poplar doors form my shop furniture

Once again another great post. I think you’re fantastic.

You put a huge effort into that thanks so much.

Incredibly thorough, thank you for this. I wonder the effects on other coniferous softwoods. Where I am, pine flooring is really popular. Dimensional lumber is also a popular budget building material, so it’d be interesting to see spruce lumber bleached. I may try bleaching the backside of my pine floors just to see if it even does anything. Lastly, the bleach came out uneven, but I wonder if the drying did anything. Also, would multiple coats make it more even? I imagine it would.