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General Restoration
Information
Like with anything which is to be
restored, refurbished, or refinished, what you begin with determines the
difficulty you have in the process. If you start with a trunk in Mint condition,
your work is simple. The initial cost for the trunk is also considerably higher
than one in good, average, or poor condition. Most trunks we have found are in
the average to poor condition with a few in the good range, and I have yet to
find one in original mint condition! Now with that said, there is a lot to
refinishing an old trunk. First of all, most of these trunks are close to or
over a Hundred years old! The metal generally is damaged, rusted, or corroded,
if it is even all there. The wood is Very Brittle and easily broken. This is a
problem when putting new nails in as the wood will often split. There is a lot
to refinishing trunks. Hardware must be removed, refinished, or replaced. The
interior must be stripped of old coverings which might be paper, leather, paint,
or cloth, and will require anything from solvents and scraping to stripping and
nail/staple removal. The exterior must be refinished which can include complete
removal of all hardware, metal, canvas, wood slats, etc. The exterior can be
more simple on some trunks, but it is always time consuming, and requires
special tools to remove the nails and hardware. If you are lucky, all the
original hardware, metal banding, slats, etc. are there. If not, you have to
find replacements, and matching what is there is often very difficult if even
possible. After all the stripping and removing, you have to refinish and
re-assemble the trunk. This is Very time consuming to get a good result.
Refinishing requires determination, time,
knowledge, and most of all, patience. It also requires
Specialized tools. That is why we suggest purchasing already
refinished trunks,
and why we sell them! However, if you have that special trunk which you want to
refinish, we want to help you with your
tool needs, and information you will
want to know.
Below is more specific information about
different types of trunk restoration.
READ THIS BEFORE TRYING IT YOURSELF!
Canvas Covered Trunks
Check out our Canvas
Covered Trunks for Sale
Removing the canvas from a flat top to be
refinished is a personal choice between original look and updating the trunk to
a new beautiful look. Once
in a while we see a flat top that has canvas good enough to leave on but this is
very rare. In this case we usually remove the old finish from the slats, sand,
maybe stain and then finish the hardwood of the staves. The canvas can then be
coated with a protective clear coat.
After the canvas is removed on a trunk being
refinished there is usually a coat of crystallized glue on the background
wood. This has to be removed before the wood can be refinished and is difficult. The wood is
cleaned as well as possible and then sanded before receiving its finish. Great
care must be taken as the wood is generally a hundred years old. The result is a
wonderful wood finish!
After the
canvas is removed from between the slats and hardware on the trunk then you're
usually left with MANY little threads under the edges of the slats and hardware.
Removing these can take a lot of time and depending on the canvas different
techniques. There is usually a lot of time and
effort spent removing the canvas from these trunks. Fortunately, the canvas has
protected the wood underneath for all those years, which allows us to have a
Great end result. The wood requires a lot of work to refinish. Lots of gluing,
sanding, staining, and Many coats of Good Tung Oil Finish with sanding between
coats to get a good finish. This takes about a week if things go well. Now you
need to clean the hardware, banding, latches, lock, etc. You generally have lots
of decorative hardware which have to be cleaned of rust, and then repainted.
Many parts had to be completely replaced, which means you have to find and buy
new hardware.
This is NOT INEXPENSIVE or EASY TO FIND!
Metal Covered Trunks
Check out our Metal
Covered Trunks for Sale
Metal covered Trunks are
divided into two types, Embossed Metal (click
here to see examples of metal patterns) and smooth steel (commonly called
tin covered). Most Trunk restorers will not Remove the metal to expose the wood
underneath due to the difficulty. In the Embossed Metal trunks, there is a lot
of cleaning, rust removal, or repair in most cases to get these trunks to look
good again. In the case where the metal is removed, it is a Very difficult
process. Metal covered trunks generally have a multitude of nails holding the
metal to the wood box and in order to remove the metal, if desired, you must
remove all the nails and all the slats and hardware to get to the base wood box
and lid. Let me say that this is a Serious Task! Not only is it very time
consuming, and difficult, but you can easily do serious damage to the wood box
and lid in the process. I remember the first one of these I did, and it
took almost a week to remove all the nails, hardware, slats, etc. When I was
done, I felt like all I had accomplished was to destroy what was once a
beautiful trunk. I decided to do the removal of the metal, because like many of
these metal covered trunks, it was damaged in some areas, and rusted in other
areas.
First of all, there are often Hundreds of nails to remove! The ends of the nails
have been turned back into the wood when they are put in to lock them in place,
so you can't just pull them out, or it will destroy the wood and tear holes in
it as well as break sections of it. You have to slowly pry them until you can
cut the heads off, then punch the nail back into the wood, nip the curl in the
nail, and then slowly pull the nails out from the inside, and you still end up
doing damage in some cases. I had many repairs to do to the wood on my first
trunk! Once you get all the hardware, banding, and metal off, you have to
strengthen the box and lid. This usually means pulling the main box and lid
nails, gluing them, and putting them back in. Then you have to fix all the
damage you've done, sand it, and refinish the wood. The wood requires a lot of
work to refinish. Lots of gluing, sanding, staining, and Many coats of Good Tung
Oil Finish with sanding between coats to get a good finish. This takes about a
week if things go well. Now you need to clean the hardware, banding, latches,
lock, etc. My first trunk had Lots of decorative hardware which I had to clean
of rust, and repaint. Many parts had to be completely replaced, which meant I
had to find and then buy new hardware.
This is NOT INEXPENSIVE or EASY TO FIND!
I finally got the box and lid refinished as well as the wood slats. Then I
replaced the metal banding as needed, put the wood slats on, replaced the
hardware, and did the finish touch-up and polish. The trunk came out to be
Incredibly Beautiful. It took over a month and a lot of cost to get it done, and
although it came out so nice, This type of trunk takes extreme time and
patience. As I do others of this type, they will Certainly have to be Very
Special trunks, and they will sell in the highest price range of the trunks we
offer.
Civil War Era Trunks
Check out our Civil
War Era Trunks for Sale
Jenny Lind Trunks
Check out our Jenny
Lind Trunks for Sale
Unique
Trunks / Wood Craftsmen Trunks
Check out our Unique/
Wood Craftsmen Trunks for Sale
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