DIY Making Beeswax Polish for Furniture

Intro: DIY Making Beeswax Polish for Furniture

Beeswax polish is great to use on a lot of different projects, no matter whether you're finishing furniture, protecting metal tools or making wooden drawers slide easier. Suffice to say, having some beeswax polish on hand is definitely a good idea! There are lots of different ways you can make beeswax finish, however this is a very simple and basic recipe that will get you far. Making your own polish is not only fun, it will also save you money. Plus, you can always alter the proportions to get a polish that fits your needs and preferences perfectly.

STEP 1: What You'll Need

Ingredients:

• 1 part solid beeswax (I used about 2 oz)
• 1 part Mineral Spirits (or Turpentine)

Equipment:

• Stove / hot plate
• Pot with water
• Stainless steel bowl
• Mason jar / metal tin or something else to store the polish in

STEP 2: Method:

Method:

Either chop off small pieces off a block of beeswax or grate your desired amount of beeswax. Prepare a double boiler. You need to melt the beeswax gently, so it's necessary to use a double boiler, much like when you melt chocolate.

Once the water comes to a simmer, put the beeswax in the stainless steel bowl on top of the pot. Slowly melt the wax until it has dissolved. At that point, add equal parts mineral spirits, and slowly combine over the double boiler. Pour into a mason jar, a metal tin or something else to store it.

Tip: It's a good idea to have a dedicated stainless steel bowl for this job, as it can be difficult to completely clean it off for food later.

STEP 3: Applying

To use:

Apply polish with a soft cloth over your desired project, wait a few minutes and buff off the excess with a clean cloth. Wax polish is great because it doesn't require any time to cure like other finishes and it can be used for so many different uses.

Concentration

For a softer polish, use a higher concentration of mineral spirits, or for a harder polish, use a higher concentration of wax.

You can also use oils such as linseed, tung oil or mineral oil, however for a soft polish with oil it's a good idea to use 1 part wax and 4 parts oil.

STEP 4: Conclusion: Watch the Video

For a more in depth look of how to make the beeswax polish, check out the video.

STEP 5: Even More Ideas

For even more ideas on how to use beeswax polish and different recipes, check out 15 Awesome Wax Hacks!

Comments

[FrankR12]

Beekeeper, I am a math deficient old person, for whom "10 parts wax to 25 parts solvent" means nothing, meaning I cannot understand what it means. Could you give an example recipe, using 1/2 poind of beeswax? How much carnauba? How much turpentine? What about linseed or coconut oil?much

[hogzilla]

"Part" means a Unit of Measure. In this case 1 Part = 2 ounces. "Part" is common to both ingredients. You would have 2 ounces of beeswax and 2 ounces of Mineral Spirits as your ingredients for this INSTRUCTABLE. I hope this helps and does not cause more confusion.

[gary.stott.549]

Did you resolve this can I ask? 10 parts wax to 25 parts solvent. Surely that would equate to 2.5 times that of the wax. So 100 grams wax would have 250grams (250ml) of Mineral spirit. Saw a good one on Martha Stuart, concerning Burt's Bees recipe for furniture wax. 4oz Wax, 4oz Turpentine, 4oz hot water, as you add each component (part) constantly stir, then a small squirt of soap to emulsify and finally some essential oil if you require. Never seen a recipe like that before, always wax, turpentine, mineral oil, usually in equal parts.

[Beekeeper]

As a beekeeper for nearly 60 years and having made hundreds and hundreds of cans of beeswax polish (plus other wax including products) it is nice to see someone promoting a traditional home product. However, this recipe could be improved considerably. Beeswax on its own is somewhat sticky - for this reason it is not recommended for making drawers slide in and out easier: regular paraffin wax is better. To improve the polish it is always recommended to substitute about 10 percent of the beeswax with carnauba wax.

Carnauba wax is a very hard natural wax that comes from the leaves of certain palm trees in Brazil. It is frequently used as a coating for pills as it makes them slide down the throat more easily, and it is also used to coat chocolates to make them shiny and to stop them melting in your hand.

And to get that real 'grandma' smell in your polish you could substitute a small quantity of pure turpentine to the liquid phase - say about 10 percent.

Finally, I always found that a ratio of 10 parts wax to 25 parts solvent gave a soft product that was easy to apply. I would think the 1:1 recipe here would be very 'heavy'.

No disrespect to the author in this comment is intended. The method is good but the recipe could be improved.

[MarisolHB]

"Finally, I always found that a ratio of 10 parts wax to 25 parts solvent gave a soft product that was easy to apply". Dear Beekeeper. An old foreign lady (me) begs for your help here! I'm trying to make a beeswax, carnauba, mineral oil, turpentine wax paste, hopefully one that I could sale at craft shows since I paint furniture. I really wanted it to be clear but I guess it will not be possible because of the natural color of carnauba. (I could maybe get white beeswax locally but not carnauba) I have made your formula, 10 parts wax to 25 and worked great although I think it came out a bit too soft to keep it's shape in the very hot weather I live in. Also there are no oils in this "recipe" and I think adding mineral oil will keep the price down. I don't know if mineral oil is a drying oil, like linseed is but don't want to use that one because of its dark color and other oils would be too expensive here. Can you be so kind as to guide me on this?? I would really appreciated.

[Laral]

Great tips. Where do you get carnauba?

[Beekeeper]

It is available on eBay and no doubt other places as well. I have a few pounds and if you lived nearby I'd give you some to try. I'm in Manitoba, Canada.

[Laral]

Thanks for the info.

[acoleman3]

i know you can get a 5/8 x 2 x 5 1/2 inch bar from woodcraft in their "waxes and polishes" section for $6.99.

[0311]

You need to know that mineral spirits is a flammable liquid and can be very dangerous if you are not careful. Read up on safe use of flammable liquids on the internet. This project should be done outdoors or under a running vent hood. It is possible to burn down your house. This has been known to happen.Bee safe. R

[xabc]

Mineral spirits, is not that flammable

[tovey]

You needn't worry, Linn doesn't do work in her house; she does it in her shop.

[BigW2802]

no one reads about using flammables

[canemaker49]

you are so awesome!! so many cool ideas and hacks for wax!! thanks! what is this brick dust and oil thing you talk about in your video? maybe you should do an iblis on that too? i use a beeswax and mineral oil on some of my walking canes mallets that i make, it works well.

[TravisC3]

Really nice instructable! I follow you on YouTube I actually made some wax paste for a cutting board I made a few weeks back and have a couple pointers if anyone wants to do this. 1) I used a sauce pan with a cleaned out spaghetti sauce jar as my double boiler. though not technically a double boiler, this worked well and I was able to easily keep all my kitchen equipment clean. 2) I added in the fluid first (In my case mineral oil) and started bringing the temp up. I did this so the wax would be exposed to the warmer temps on all sides 3) beeswax maintains it's weight/volume equivalents. Meaning 1lb of wax is 16 volume ounces (sorry if this is a duh, I'm not always the brightest person) 4) The melting temp for beeswax is 62 to 64C (144 to 147F) while heating past 85C (185F) will discolor the wax so keep an eye on your temps. 5) as your wax melts continue to stir frequently to promote faster melting and even distribution. I have to say that it worked GREAT on my cutting board. To cut my wax I used a heat wire (nickel chromium 30 gauge, there are some good instructables on here to make a heat wire). I followed the wire with a large putty knife through the melted wax, came off with virtually no effort. these were just my thoughts and how I did it.

[skippy_oz]

In Australia we use Gum Turpentine which is made from the eucalyptus tree and has the scent of eucalyptus which make the Bee Wax Polish smells nice.

[gog8orz]

the 1 part beeswax... Is that measured pre-melt? Or do you measure post-melt and put an equal amount of mineral spirits?

Also, can you add candle scents? Just curious

[Beekeeper]

Usually parts by weight. I recommend for example 2 oz/50 gms wax (beeswax + 10% carnauba) and 5 oz/125gms solvent (mineral spirits + 10% turpentine to give it a traditional smell).

You could probably add candle scent but why?

[gog8orz]

Because I'm going to use it on my antique table, and I thought it might be nice to add the smell of honeysuckle to the room :-)

Thanks!

[Beekeeper]

Ah, yes, honeysuckle may be nice, but when they made that antique table I doubt very much if they added any perfumes to their polish. To me it's like repairing an old antique with MDF/particle board or even plastic. To be authentic I would always make it natural.