Hello,
I made a couple Tea Boxes from Select Pine. The design features a realistic over-under basket weave pattern on all four sides and a deep-relief "dished" teapot design with leaf accents for the lid. The finished Tea Box is approximately 12” wide x 8¼” deep x 5½” tall- the slightly lighter one was finished as follows:
- Cabot Pre-Stain Wood Conditioner
- Minwax Golden Pecan #245 stain
- one coat Amber Shellac
- three coats Minwax water-based Satin polycrylic
...the darker one as follows:
- one very light coat of thinned Bullseye Sealcoat
(2 parts sealer/3 parts Denatured alcohol)
- sanded lightly again with very fine sandpaper & Dremel
- Cabot Brown Mahogony #8134 stain
- three coats Minwax water-based Satin polycrylic
I tested/compared BEST and OPTIMUM settings when carving the box sides (BEST was 5 hrs. - Optimum was 8 hrs.). The Optimum is definitely the better way to go on any design that is as intricate as the over-under weave pattern. I did do both box lids on Optimum setting - 4½ hrs. each (would have been about 2 hrs. each on "Best").
I was impressed with the noticable difference in overall carve quality on the raw wood. Much less "fuzzies" in the tight crevices on the Optimum one. Can't tell much difference now, as I used my Dremel to make them look pretty much the same. One just has to decide whether to spend the time "upfront" for the carve itself, or some time after-the-carve for cleanup. Also, this was Select Pine, which carves very well for me, but I imagine if it were Cherry or Walnut, neither "Best" nor "Optimum" would have had any after-the-carve cleanup.
By the way, the clean-up on the "Best" setting version didn't take me 3 hrs (the difference in time between Best and Optimum). Cleanup was maybe 30 or 40 minutes with my trusty Dremel, 3M wheels and a fine-tipped diamond point. Still, when you look close, you can see the Optimum one is a little more precise in the weave detail, so for me, I think the extra carve time was worth it.