Clay,

I did exactly what the CLC varnishing shop tip says to do. I saw John Harris demonstrate the technique at an Okoumefest shop demo and it turned out great, so I did everything he did - disposable foam brushes, Interlux Schooner varnish, criss-cross srokes.

I understand that the Interlux Schooner is no longer available and that the replacement needs to be thinned, so the description in the shop tips is not quite complete anymore.

Over in this thread, Joey Schott describes how he does his varnishing. Considering that back in 2006 (long before he became a member of the CLC team) he won the Okoumefest "Best in Show" award, you couldn't go wrong following his advice.

Finally, remember that everything that can go wrong with a varnish finish can be easily fixed with a bit of sandpaper, water, a brush and some more varnish. You're basically done. You have built a boat, all you're doing is adding the last 0.020 inches to the outside. The hard part is over and your investment is safe. Heck, you can even take it out for a spin before you start varnishing it.

So have fun and enjoy the process,

Laszlo

Oops - here's the link to the thread where Joey tells us how he varnishes. It's the second from the bottom.

Laszlo

I have read all the posts about using Schooner Gold vs the original Schooner.  I decided that I was not going to use Schooner Gold and was going to use something else.  However, I found Shcooner at another online source and it will arrive on Monday.