What I did was to ask Brad to give me a piece of scrap walnut from one of the midhorns, and I took it to a CNC shop to cut my logo into it. I put a sheet of adhesive plastic on it as a mask and had them cut through that so I could paint the letters silver. Then I peeled off the mask to expose the walnut, and I'm rubbing tung oil into it. I thought it might be a good practice for me, since the only time I ever used tung oil was for touch up. This time, I wanted to see what uyou guys do to finish something properly.

It's like wiping on vegetable oil or something, almost like water. I just use a cloth and wipe the stuff on in a very thin coat. I watch the reflection at an angle to see when the coat is uniform, then I go away for a few minutes. Maybe ten or fifteen minutes later, I come back and do it again.

The first coat darkened the grain a little, just like I had moistened it with water. But the grain absorbs it and makes it look like you haven't done anything except darken it a tad. It took probably 20 coats before I could even tell it was holding a finish. Now it's starting to get a little shiny, but it seems like it will take 100 coats like this. That's no problem, it's easy, I just wipe it on. It's no more difficult than wiping a counter with a sponge. I rub it in a little, but it isn't like polishing a car or anything, it's more like just wiping it on.

Is that what I'm supposed to do? It looks good, but is this the way tung oil is generally used?

• Tung Oil tips

Soak it down.

Wait overnight.

Using fine (000) steel wool, rub oil into the wood like Simonizing a car in the old days.

Keep on rubbing till it shines.

If you apply another coat before the preceding coat hardened, then you end up re-dissolving, so to speak, the coat you just put on and don’t get as much build up as if you wait 4 hours to overnight. A fan can help speed things along.

After two coats I use either fine steel wool or 600-1500 paper and smooth of the surface again.

You can keep doing this until you’re happy with the finish.

It occured to me that people always use sheet stock and then add braces. Some do the B&W thing and add a honeycomb of sorts to fill and stiffen from the interior.

Has anybody considered emulating a "stress panel" - building a frame out of say 2X2s and then covering the outside/inside with something like 1/2" MDF. I guess the cavities could be filled with Great Stuff or similar (expanding foam). That would result in walls 2-1/4 inches thick - ought to be quite stiff, like a helicopter floor. The baffle would probably be solid, or at least it would be most convienient.

There are also different types of tung oil too. "Natural" takes longer to dry. Polymerized are faster drying and I find is better at building a coat (which I don't like to do). "High Lustre" tung oil from Lee Valley can build a lacquer-like finish, but is difficult to use straight out of the bottle. I like to use a blend of Lee Valley's High Lustre and "natural" tung oil as final coat. One part High Lustre with 4 parts "natural" gives me a soft sheen.

Gar.