Yep minwax "tung oil" isn't really tung oil at all - it
might have some in it but I've never seen much evidence to support that it does. Primarily it an oil based wiping varnish (not sure on the oil, probably either linseed or soya but doesn't matter to much because its been converted into varnish) - effectively its just a varnish with a bunch of mineral spirits added.
Having said that wiping varnish like the minwax product is a really easy way to do a decent finish on furniture type projects. Its usually a fair bit cheaper to buy varnish and then cut it yourself (although I sometimes find sales so have used the minwax product a bit
). I wouldn't use it as a "furniture polish" per-say (i.e. usually wouldn't use it on top of another finish unless I knew what it was for sure) but I would happily use it as a furniture finish (might be slicing hairs there). Once its cured a top coat of wax can help gloss it up a little imho although its not strictly necessary.
When using a wiping varnish (and not claiming this is the BEST way by any means at all - just how I use it so grain of salt) I usually like to do 6-9 coats (although 3-4 starts looking pretty good, I like to do it pretty thin so it builds slower and imho has more visual depth). Rough plan would be sand to 150-220 grit, put on a first coat let set for 12-24 hours, then sand back with 220 until its flush. After that I usually do a coat every ~12 hours (8 seems to be ok, 12 usually lines up better with before and after work
) and lightly sand off any nibs between them with 320 (for the first couple anyway then may move up to 400-600). The last couple of coats I like to put on thinner with no sanding and then buff out after its cured fully for 3-4 days with a crumpled brown paper bag. Often I will topcoat that with 1-3 coats of paste wax buffed between them which makes it delightfully smooth and shiny. Again there are dozens of different ways people do this, this just works for me (and I wouldn't necessarily suggest this as a restoration process but for stuff around the home its dandy).
This article explains oil based varnish pretty well:
http://www.hardwoodlumberandmore.co...e/tabid/75/ArticleId/2/Oil-Based-Varnish.aspx
All of their finishing articles are decent in general (and helped me figure out what some of the differences were between the different misleadingly named products on the market):
http://www.hardwoodlumberandmore.com/Articles.aspx