How To Tell What Type Of Wood Your Furniture Is

Rare woods are used where appearance is important such as table tops.

How to tell what type of wood your furniture is. If the wood is a soft wood your fingernail will leave an indention. Bought at thrift store on west coast and is very heavy. To identify the type of clear film finish on a piece of furniture you test it with solvents.

Furniture on which there are oil finishes repairs easily. Most old wooden furniture you will encounter most likely will be either traditional english or american colonial styles. If your piece has wavy or irregular grain patterns you may be dealing with burl wood and not just a certain wood type.

If you like any of the styles we just described you might like antique furniture. You can usually tell different types of wood apart by looking at the wood grain color and the visibility of growth rings. A list of a few current furniture design types includes.

Wood has two kinds of grain a close grain and a coarse grain. The more common woods are used for less conspicuous structural pieces such as table and chair legs. Identifying your furniture s wood can sometimes be the deciding factor in figuring out if your furniture is worth being refinished or if it should be thrown away.

The following criteria will help you determine if your old furniture is an english made antique. Simply apply more oil finish after removing wax or furniture polish with mineral spirits or soap and water. At least a century old antique furniture is typically made from wood and has unique ornate details that allow dealers to easily date them.

See the chart below to find out just do the following. After you figure this out you ll know if you can apply the new finish you want over top or if the wood has to be stripped. By you being able to identify the type of wood or woods used for your furniture can help you determine your furniture s real value is.