Engineerchic-the process is time consuming, but not overly difficult if that makes sense. A LOT of literal "waiting for paint to dry" time involved. Here is a detailed rundown:
1. Put on GOOD chemical resistant, but DISPOSABLE gloves, eye protection and a mask rated to prevent inhalation of nasty crap. I forget the number on mine I got. The stripper burns if it gets on your skin. Ask me how I know.
1. Apply Stripper-x with a paintbrush to surfaces. Do NOT get the "done in 15 minute" one. You must use the 1/2 hour one. Home Depot it is about $15/gallon. I think it took me a gallon and a half for the entire kitchen. Let it sit for 1/2 hour, maybe a bit longer.
2. Take a plastic putty knife and scrape the gunk into a cardboard box. It is basically striper mixed with stain from your old cabinets.
3.At this point, depending on what color you want, you may need to use the stripper again to pull ALL of the stain. When I did my first set of cabinets, I did them 2x and they revealed this wonderful light wood. I did this to my frame and one cabinet door in my kitchen and the result was near identical from 1 strip to the other, so I skipped the second dose of stripping the wood on my kitchen. Just depends on the wood they used I guess.
4. There will be leftover residue from the stripper. It is sticky! Use steel wool pads and mineral spirits and rags to remove all of the residue.
5. Mineral spirits wet the wood pretty well, so allow to dry before doing the next step. Also, after all of the scraping, odds are you won't want to sand right away regardless.
6. Sand down all surfaces. I used 220 grit for the cabinets and used a slightly more rough grit in areas I could tell the stripper had left a bit of old stain or finish behind.
7. Run over all surfaces to remove sawdust. I use a shopvac and then tack cloth.
8. Apply stain. I used Varathane Dark Walnut. I did NOT use gel stain which i know a lot of people here like. I THINK if I recall correctly I skipped it because it required sanding in between coats. The regular doesn't require this. I used sponge applicators-basically sponges that are wrapped in cloth sold in a 3 pack at home depot. You dip it in the stain and wipe. Easier than painting. Just go with the grain, start on the BACK of doors! Again, ask how I know this. Let dry 2 hours, apply another coat until desired color is reached. Do NOT try to cut corners on dry time. When you go to wipe on the second coat, it will pull the first off and make a MESS if not totally dry. I did 3 coats on mine. Did 2, it looked fine, did 3, it looked FABULOUS.
9. After the stain has dried 8 hours, you can apply polyurethane. I used varathane clear in Satin finish. I applied with a brush, just following the grain, making sure to cover all surfaces evenly. This stuff drips, so try not to slather it on. You need at least 2 coats. Allow 4 hours to dry between coats, but no more than 12 or you have to sand between coats. I always did one in the morning, one in the afternoon. The less sanding I have to do the better!
Allow to dry for about 24 hours then you can hang them.
I did these in my garage. They are not perfect. I have 2 dogs and I'm sure I can pull plenty of DNA from them to clone my dogs from their piece of fur that I couldn't avoid. One day I left them to dry my beagle figured she'd leave a permanent mark and WALKED on the doors! So, one of my doors has a faint paw print that I couldn't wipe out completely. I figured 10 years from now I'll look longingly at the door and remember my fur baby.
I did these all alone. Only help from my husband was helping rehang them and watching my girls when I was working. When doing the interior frames, make sure you do it on a nice, preferably breezy day as the stuff is nasty and needs to air out a LOT. If I had had help, one person doing the interior while the other was doing doors, drawers, it could have been done in a week. I figure day 1-strip and mineral spirits(all surfaces, front and back), day 2-sand(all surfaces) and stain(all surfaces/ BACK side of doors), day 3 polyurethane(all surfaces/BACK side of doors), day 4 dry, day 5 front of doors-stain, day 6 Front of doors-poly day 7 dry.
I had no help. I think my inner peninsula area took me about 3 days for the frame. Then we got a slab leak and had to use my kitchen budget to repipe the house(which you can see the scars of the 64 holes in my house on the ceilings and the wall in the pics)SO I let the doors sit for a while--like a long while-girls started school, winter hit, so weather wasn't ideal, I was Cookie mom for my daughter's troop. . . We lived without doors for months. Then I did the frames of the wall with the fridge 2 weeks ago and the doors this week.
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Steel framed cabinets with glass inserts
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