Refinishing bedroom set: Chemical stipping or sanding

[Jesus Aleman]

The boss has asked me to refinish a bedroom set that has tons of scratches and is outdated.  She has asked me to re-stain it, change the front of the drawers and add new hardware.  There are 2 large dressers and 2 night-side tables.  The better looking night dresser is shown in the attached picture.    My main dilemma right now is whether to sand or strip with chemicals.  I'm inclined to sand, but I would like to hear opinions.  Cheers.

 

[Jonhilgen]

No pics...

 

[waho6o9]

Send it out to have stripped, re-glue any loose joints, sand and stain.  It's a hassle either way, I prefer to send it out. Good luck in your decision.    [smile]

 

[Holzhacker]

This is always a bit of a tricky question. My buddy (dead a few years now) ran a stripping shop for decades so I have a little experience.
Whether veneer or solid wood. I would start out with stripping first for various reasons. Gets the top layers of finish off, pulls some of the finish out of the grain, reduces overall sanding amount and therefore loss of wood thickness. After that you can move onto finer sanding.
Doing a whole set is a lot of work. I don't know that I would tackle that either from a time perspective or breathing that crap. If you don't have a dedicated garage/patio space you can keep the pieces while working on them I would lean towards not doing it yourself. I personally wouldn't do it in my shop. The amount of time it would take would make my shop smell like stripper for far too long and make doing anything else in there miserable.
If you decide to take it to a shop and don't have a place yet. Go check them out, see some pieces they are working on, make sure they know to use various grits of steel wool, no wire brush on veneers, if Oak keep the water to a minimum, (hot water bathing with steel wool and stripper is a common technique) etc.
Good luck

 

[Oldwood]

I have had good luck with the chemical strippers. I get a big bag of coarse planer shavings on hand then coat the piece in stripper and keep it wet for as long as it takes to soften the finish. Then with good protective gloves get large handfuls of the wood shavings and rub down the piece quite aggressively. The shavings soak up the stripper and old finish and can be swept up and disposed of afterwords. If you fill a container with shavings and then pour the stripper over the shavings until soaked you can use them to rub into carvings etc. The active ingredient in the stripper is very heavy so when comparing two gallon containers take the one  that weighs the most. Lot of ventilation and a proper mask are required. I have stripped pieces with this procedure that required almost no sanding . The gel style stripper works better on vertical surfaces.

HTH
Gerry

 

[Scott Rollins]

I do this alot also (3 years of antique refinishing for local antique stores).  And I have to say that it depends alot on the piece.  If it is a store bought item that is less than 80 years old then use a stripper to start with.  If they are very old then they are likely shellac.  Try a rag soaked in alcohol and lay it on the piece with some plastic sheating over it.  If the finish gets tacky after a minute or two then you are in luck.  Just work in 2 foot square areas and wet a rag in denatured alcohol and cover for 15 mins with plastic.  Carefully peal back a 6 inch area and rub vigorously with alcohol soaked rag and off it will come-without removing the colorant underneath.  This works great on curved pieces and carvings.
If it is a relatively new piece then it is likely veneered.  Do not get tempted top use anything coarser than 150 grit sandpaper.  You will blow right through the veneer thus ruining the piece before you knew what happened. 
Depending on the size an entire bedroom set could take 8-10 hours to strip sand and finish over 3-4 days (waiting for stripper to dry so you can sand, staining, finishing, etc)
Good luck and I like to use Jasco Gel Stripper due to the low odor and easy cleanup (it is a little costly though) and available at Lowes.