ehensel1

From everything that I've done, and seen, no, it will not work as good as an actual air conditioner. I couldn't put an air conditioner in my room, but I had free access to ice, and electricity, so this was the next best thing for me.

If you want a more diffused look, the easiest way would be to take a random orbital sander, start with 100 grit, and sand up to 220. By the time it's nice and smooth, you should have a nice opaque look to it. It might not be as diffused as you want, but will be better than just clear epoxy. You don't even need an electric sander if you don't have one, but sanding it by hand will take some elbow grease!

My pleasure! The added benefit is that you never have to worry about scratching your beautiful board!

That bed looks great! You need to post an Instructable on how you made that!

You're correct, it's not period correct. But neither is the dye, the stain, the sandpaper, etc. If you don't like Poly, you could always use something like Waterlox.

How deep do you have your plane set? I normally have mine for really thin shavings, which I'm afraid would be too thin. When I set it for deeper, I normally gouge the heck out of my wood. Great work by the way!