Best finish for restoring antique toilet seat

[Tim Brennan]

We have an antique pine toilet seat which needs a bit of restoration work. Today I removed the old varnish using the DTS 400 and then finished with furniture wax polish.  Results look pretty good but unfortunately it doesn't seem to repel water very well at all.

I have some Danish oil and some osmo UV protection oil.  Would either these be suitable finishes or do I need something else?

 

[HarveyWildes]

I did a bathroom countertop about four years ago out of African Mahogany, which has reasonably large pores.  I decided to use an oil finish because I wanted the finish down in the wood.  This may seem like an excessive amount of work, but based on an article that said that it takes about 25 coats of oil finish to make a walnut gunstock waterproof, I put 20 coats of mineral spirits/oil/poly finish on the thing, gradually increasing the % of poly and decreasing the % or mineral spirits.  I finished it off with 2 or 3 coats of wax.  It is reasonably waterproof, unless the granddaughters spill large amounts of water on it and then no one wipes it up for several days.  In which case, the grain fusses up just a hair.  It just took a little 2000 grit wet/dry sanding, another couple coats of oil, and some wax to get it back to new.  I'm thinking that you might be able to get by with fewer coats, since pine has smaller pores.

 

[leakyroof]

For a toilet seat, wouldn't you want to seal the pores of the wood to prevent bacteria or other germs from gaining a foothold?
I would think Varnish is pretty good for that over an oil finish when dealing with E. Coli and the like.... [huh]

 

[Michael Kellough]

Ditto Leaky, or use epoxy.

 

[nickao]

We have an antique pine toilet seat which needs a bit of restoration work. Today I removed the old varnish using the DTS 400 and then finished with furniture wax polish.  Results look pretty good but unfortunately it doesn't seem to repel water very well at all.

I have some Danish oil and some osmo UV protection oil.  Would either these be suitable finishes or do I need something else?

We have an 1886 custom one off Victorian in the family and for sure the toilet seats were(and still are) all shellacked as well as all the quartered white oak throughout.