Can I Gel Stain Laminate Cabinets

Gel stains as all wood stains were formulated to go over raw wood which has an open surface and can absorb some of the stain.

Can i gel stain laminate cabinets.

Laminate is very smooth and shiny so you must sand or the paint and the gel stain won t stick. They weren t awful i did live with them for many years like this and was content until the idea of mixing it up came to the forefront. A laminate stain can be a gel or tinted polyurethane. Don t apply too thickly.

Sorry that it s so long but i wanted to make sure i covered as mu. Beginning with the backside of the cabinet coat each cabinet lightly with the gel stain using an old cloth or foam brush. Do not remove the stain treat it like a paint. Apply gel stain i decided to stain the drawers and paint the body to match the.

Open up the laminate stain cans and check for instructions on how to stain the cabinets on the sides of the cans. Fortunately for those with laminate cabinets gel stain works well on a variety of surfaces other than real wood allowing you to stain your cabinets without leaving them a streaky splotchy mess. In most cases you ll simply need to coat a paintbrush in laminate stain and apply the stain coating evenly to the surface of the cabinet itself. With gel stain you don t have this problem because the wood doesn t absorb the stain.

You could choose to use minwax. When using gel stain even though no uneven spots. The gel will cover up the wood grain that is in the plastic while the tinted polyurethane will allow the faux grain look to show through. Your basic stock laminate cabinets with an orangish color to them.

Otherwise the laminate will just sit in a sticky layer on top of the laminate and be tacky each time you go to open the cabinet. Lay out the cabinets over a set of newspapers or scrap paper and prepare to stain them. Customers have reported the successful use of gel products over laminate surfaces. It will appear streaky.

You re going to be amazed at the difference a little java gel stain can accomplish. But if you have any doubts about your stripping and staining skills it s definitely worth hiring a pro. Lightly sand the laminate with 150 grit sandpaper.