ARCHIVED FORUM -- March 2012 to February 2022READ ONLY FORUM
This is the second Archived Forum which was active between 1st March 2012 and 23rd February 2022
I am interested in the care of the wood trim on Beograms, the veneers on the Beomasters, as well as how to care for various wood-surfaced speakers. I did a bit of research and this is what I found.
Anyone living in North America during the latter portion of the 20th Century could not possibly escape the barrage of colorful television commercials and attention grabbing print advertisements touting the amazing abilities of their products to enhance, nourish, protect, and preserve your fine wood furniture. (This applies equally well to our B&O products.)
On television is was always a beautifully coffered lady unwaveringly wearing pearls who would wipe Old English Lemon Oil, Pledge, Endust, or other similar products over a dusty wood surface and like magic, the full beauty of the wood was revealed and with a lovely smile.
To this day I can’t get that lively jungle out of my head promoting lemon oil, “Lemon oil very pretty and it is good for your wood…..”
Print advertising was equally compelling and served to reinforce the message that these wood care products really did enhance, nourish, protect, replace the natural oils in the wood, and preserve wood. Scott’s Liquid Gold went so far as to say “preservative” on the can label.
But did they? The answer is no, none of the well advertised wood care products fulfilled their claims, with one exception, which I will get to later.
The main cause of wood finish deterioration is exposure to strong sunlight, excessive heat, water, solvents, and physical abuse. All the miracle products of the sixties, seventies, and eighties were powerless to do anything about any of these issues with the exception of physical abuse, as most of the wood care products do indeed leave the finish surface slippery which does temporally protect against abrasion.
So what do the wood care products offer?
Primarily these products leave a glossy and attractive finish that temporally fills in the cracks allowing the light to reflect back at you rather than scattered in all directions, which in turn tricks the eye into seeing more color and depth in the wood, especially on deteriorated wood finishes.
Polishes also leave a temporary protection against scratching and are excellent cleaning agents removing grease and grime.
In the case of lemon oil, which contains no citrus products whatsoever, it leaves a pleasant, if artificial lemon scent, which is appealing. Lemon oil products are petroleum based so you could get a similar effect wiping either mineral spirits or kerosene on either your Beogram trim or furniture, but the smell would be unfortunate. This is why commercial products come with the scent of a lemon.
In addition to the liquid polishes, there are an assortment of wood waxes which will are more time consuming to apply, but last considerably longer.
So how best to care for the wood trim and wood veneers on our Bang & Olufsen equipment? Well caring for our stereo equipment is easier than our home furniture; the single most important thing is to keep our equipment out of direct sunlight. After that common sense says don’t expose the wood to solvents, water, excessive heat, or physical abuse.
So what to do if the finish does not respond to polish or wax? In this case where the finish is so badly deteriorated the only choice is to carefully sand the surface smooth, thoroughly clean the surface, and then apply one or more coats of Danish Oil, Minwax, or other readily available products according to the directions on the chosen product.
In the case of veneer, extra care must be taken so as not to sand through the thin layer of wood.
After the wood looks its best from either polish, wax, or refinishing, sit back and enjoy the sound.
Jeff
Beogram 4000, Beogram 4002, Beogram 4004, Beogram 8000, Beogram 8002, Beogram 1602. Beogram 4500 CD player, B&O CDX player, Beocord 4500, Beocord 5000 T4716, Beocord 5000 T4716, Beocord 5000 T4716, Beocord 8004, Beocord 9000, Beomaster 1000, Beomaster 1600, Beomaster 2400.2, Beomaster 2400.2, Beomaster 4400, Beomaster 4500, Beolab 5000, Beomaster 5000, BeoCenter 9000. BeoSound Century, S-45.2, S-45.2, S-75, S-75, M-75, M-100, MC 120.2 speakers; B&O Illuminated Sign (with crown & red logo). B&O grey & black Illuminated Sign, B&O black Plexiglas dealer sign, B&O ash tray, B&O (Orrefors) dealer award vase, B&O Beotime Clock. Navy blue B&O baseball cap, B&O T-shirt X2, B&O black ball point pen, B&O Retail Management Binder
Todays very modern house wife and house care assistants are doing wood care with a rag and a spray bottle, which may contain anything from detergent to scented petroleum. They never clean the wood they just add something upon the dirt and grease already there.
When we wood lovers get something old in our hands, you can be sure that you get totally dried out wood, or wood barely visible under layers of different "wood care" products or, God forbid, Pledge.
Very seldom you comes upon a unit well cared for.
I am totally into: Clean with ISP, sand, clean, sand, soak in boiled linseed oil, wipe off excess, let dry, lightly sand, clean, oil, let dry, polish, done
Then normaly dust, or just wipe off with a rag moistened with a mild water detergent mix. every 2-3 years, clean with ISP and oil again
Collecting Vintage B&O is not a hobby, its a lifestyle.
In the case of very grimy wood blinds I would use a mixture of ammonia and water….. not too strong as that would not benefit the wood.
However with all my B&O products I use Old English Lemon Oil to wonderful effect. As mentioned in my post, this is a petroleum based product designed for wood care and while it does not rejuvenate the wood as the advertisements of the past claimed, it truly does a superb job of cleaning the wood of grease, grime, fingerprints, etc.
The two sets of speakers (S75 and S45) that came with my BeoCenter 9000 were in deplorable condition. I used the lemon oil on them and frankly one application was not enough. However after several applications the end result is fantastic and this from an absolute perfectionist.
I spent a good deal of time at Valley Tools, a very high end specialty wood-working store who preferred to sell me extraordinarily expensive wood care products, but when pressed they grudgingly acknowledged that the Lemon Oil that I was using would do an “acceptable” job.
Back to your blinds, dishwashing soap would do a fine job of cleaning, but would not leave the sheen the Lemon Oil does, so why not get the benefit of the shine while cleaning your blinds?
The only wood I have that's been around long enough for me to evaluate how well I've done in keeping it up are a few 34 year old pieces of teak Danish modern furniture. I've used what was called "teak oil" which appeared to be some kind of natural oil, probably linseed oil or such, with some they alleged was teak juice or coloring or whatever in it. It's dark. Lately I've been using more traditional furniture oils.
All pieces that've been kept up this way are still in great shape. The one that's gotten the most abuse is of course the dining room/kitchen table. Periodically I have to clean it with some fine steel wool dipped in oil to remove stains, stuck on stuff, etc. then reoil it. Aside from a few deep scratches it still looks as new.
That's the limit of my wisdom on maintaining wood though.
I'm afraid I'm recovering from the BeoVirus.
Hello Jeff,
Teak and Rosewood are the only woods commonly found in furniture or stereos for that matter that contain oil.
Teak is one wood that responds to the specialty teak oil products.
Hello All,
Three months ago I purchased a set rosewood S75. Since then Ive been looking around for the best way of refinishing the cabinets. This forum shows multiple ways of doing this:
-Boiled linseed oil-Danish oil-Beeswax-Lemon oil
The only experience I have is with linseed oil. This product is very easy to use since it can be applied with a rag and is absorbed by the surface. Dust is therefore not included in the layer. Danish oil is roughly the same but maybe leaves a more shiny finish (haven't used it). Having used beeswax on some furniture, I can imagine that this gives a great finish. The problem with wax is that the old layer needs to be rubbed off before a new one can be applied. I therefore look to other methods. Lemon oil is also unknown to me but seems to be a similar product to linseed/danish oil.
The problem is that people prefer different methods but comparisons are rarely made. SInce so many old veneer is being threated onewould expect that this information is at hand
I experimented with linseed oil on the bottom of one of my cabinets yesterday. Tonight I'll apply the second coat. Ill post some before/after pictures of the different layers and the effects.
I start cleaning with Isopropyl alcohol, depending on how dirty (layers of Pledge, wax or lacquered with something) at times I use acetone for the first cleaning, careful acetone may damage plastics and loosen glues.
Then sand the wood with 200 grain sand paper or this (these hand pads I find better than sandpaper, they dont run full, and you can use them over and over again) I sand until small scratches and marks disappear and the surfaces has the same color over all, deep damages can be repaired with a mix of wood glue and sanding dust.
Mix the dust with glue until you have a heavy paste, clean the damage with a cutter and acetone, press the paste into the scratch/hole, level off wit a knife or spatula. This only for smaller deep scratches, if bigger, you will have to cut out the damaged veneer and glue in a new piece of veneer fitting the grain and cut out.
When the repaired areas are dry, sand again with 200 grain or hand pad, if you want a finer finish, sand with 400 grain, Clean off dust with a brush and then with Iso alcohol or a rag moistened with water, let dry. Now soak the wood with Boiled linseed oil (also known as Danish Oil), after half an hour, wipe off excess, let dry for 12 hours, sand lightly with hand pad or 400 grain, clean off dust, soak with oil, 1/2 hour, wipe off excess, let dry 12 hours, polish with lint free rag, done. After a couple of years, sand light, clean, soak, wipe off excess, let dry, polish, and it looks like new again.
The Linseed oil stinks, so do this outside or in the garage.
For sanding, use a sanding block or a piece of wood that fits in your hand, wrapped with sanding paper or hand pad. Do NOT use machine, the veneer is very thin on some some items.
Here a pic from Sonavors speaker top, you can see the darker areas that still has to be sanded to the same color as the lighter areas. After oiling the wood it will get darker again, and the grain be more highlighted.
Daily (weekly) cleaning with rag moistened with soapy water. Use no furniture sprays or cleaners.
Thank You, this thread is very interesting, I hope it can be stored in "Archived Forum.
Best regards
René.
remdk: Thank You, this thread is very interesting, I hope it can be stored in "Archived Forum. Best regards René.
Archived forums is for the older threads, before we changed to a new server, nothing new can be stored there, but I like to put threads like this in the Wiki files, will do.
Now posted in Wiki here
Thank You Søren, this is superb.
René