Match the RV trim

[Darren Wright]

I'm looking to somewhat match the fold up table I'm making to door trim color in our RV. It's kind of a weathered barnwood look.

I picked up 3 different stains, did a SWC (shellac wash coat) on the sample board, which is a cutoff of the same material as the table.

I then did a sample of each of the two grays, and an ebony as we have a lot of black trim inside as well.


I think the middle gray is a good match, but there is a lot of black tones in the RV trim. So I tried some of the gray over the black. It did smudge out some of the black as I applied it.


I think its a very close match.

Do you think sealing the black with SWC before applying the gray will keep it from smudging out the black?

 

[Dave Hawksford]

Darren, dry brush the darker coat. Thin 50/50.

 

[Dave Hawksford]

If you do the light gray 1st over glaze with the darker. Run a test to make sure the lighter is dry enough. To apply the thin darker glaze.

 

[Darren Wright]

So gave this a try with gray, then a swc seal coat, then the black. It didn't turn out as expected, I may have over done it with the black to cover some of the yellow of the pine.


I think one of the things that is throwing me off is the yellow of the pine. I feel like it needs to be neutralized with some brown before adding the gray and black colors. The table portion is a different species of pine that has even more yellow, which doesn't match the backer board above.

Luckily I have a wide belt sander, will start with a clean slate tomorrow.

 

[Ted Calver]

From the picture, the RV door does look more brown than grey.

 

[Darren Wright]

From the picture, the RV door does look more brown than grey.

Yeah, I agree. The test board was such a small piece, just didn't get as much of a view of all the yellows from it that are in the large pieces. I also had to mix more SWC up and dont think it was thinned as much as the test board was, so it was sealing between stains more which was actually what caused some of the stark contrast, things just aren't blending as well. Probably too much black in there too.

With all the black trim, I probably should just do it in ebony and call it good.

 

[Darren Wright]

Got a lot closer after starting over. I went with a dark Early American stain for the brown, then some thinned down black, and finally some thinned gray. The pics below still had some pretty dark streaks on them, but was able to remove some of that with some thinner and repeat back to get it almost right. Still a little dark, but good enough for now. Will work on some rattle can poly the next day or two to finish them up.

 

[Darren Wright]

Ran out and installed the table over lunch. It's still a bit darker, but close enough.

 

[Brent Dowell]

Looks great to me!