# Staining fiberglass door



## quizzylish (Aug 24, 2010)

Hey guys. I had a question about staining a fiberglass door. I just finished my first coat of stain with walnut color. It seems that the woodgrain is showing through a lot more than I thought it would. The woodgrain is lighter in color, showing through is the beige undercoat. Is it usually necessary to use two coats or is this pretty close to how the look is supposed to be? I value any help you can give. Attached are some pictures. Thank you.


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## CK_68847 (Apr 17, 2010)

I hate doing fiberglass doors. I think it is important you see the grain in the door. I dont know why you would want to hide it. If that was the case, paint the door dark brown. The one thing I have had problems with in the past is the exterior of the door. All of the stain kits I have ever used included latex varnish, and it has flaked off on the exterior on a couple doors. Ive never found a kit that uses an oil or spar varnish.


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## quizzylish (Aug 24, 2010)

Okay. I see how it looks when its totally dry. I know what you mean about the finish. I wanted to use an Old Masters stain, but they didn't have anything dark enough. The deep red I thought would work but the vintage burgandy came out purple. I did pick up Old Masters oil-based spar varnish, it stated it could be used on both interior and exterior. So I'll give that a try.


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## StefanC (Apr 29, 2009)

That door looks very dark. What was the brand and original color of the door?


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## Retired (Jul 27, 2010)

A second coat of stain should take care of that undercoat burnthrough. To really get rid of that beige IMO, it's good to paint over the factory beige with top grade exterior rated alkyd undercoat or even a finish paint in low gloss if you don't want color contrast in the door.

As good as some of the waterbournes are, the alkyd I think looks better on a front door. For weatherproofing a coat or two of a marine grade alkyd poly should result in years of service. 

For those resin coated doors with the impressed grain structure when a more dramatic look is wanted, exhibiting the grain rather than subdueing it can be effected using gel stain or even a gel stain/alkyd poly combo from suppliers like Bartleys. SW's Minwax label has gel stains and a combo stain and poly mix in several colors. For a door skin a small can can be bought at Home Depot. 

One of the essentials in graining is to begin with a color or chroma that "matches" the lightest value in wood to be replicated. These cookie cutter doors are just the reverse since the highs and lows in the "grain" are bassackward. My call is to paint em all first then do the other, whatever that is going to be.


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## DeanV (Apr 18, 2007)

I find once they are painted though, it just does not take stain realistically at all any more and you need to do more of a faux woodgrain finish, and I am no good at faux anything.


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## LCI (Jan 2, 2009)

I always use a bonding primer on the exteriors. they tend to flake and peel if you dont, even though theres no intructions stating to do so..scuff sand ur primer and your stain should look fine..


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## Lambrecht (Feb 8, 2010)

I have done a lot of these doors, two coats Old Masters gel stain, 2-3 coats spar poly and your good to go. If you need a stain that gets darker with each coat use Zar gel stain. I have never had to paint one of these to acheive a "real" wood look.


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## MNpainter (Jul 17, 2008)

LCI said:


> I always use a bonding primer on the exteriors. they tend to flake and peel if you dont, even though theres no intructions stating to do so..scuff sand ur primer and your stain should look fine..


?????????????? they are designed to be stained and the a clear coat applied. or painted. Never had an adhesion problem. You may need to reconsider the products you are using. steve


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## Retired (Jul 27, 2010)

Nobody here that has painted and stained ten thousand of these doors and is willing to share exactly how to? 

Some of these doors come in a raw state ie no prime coat from the manufacturer. The skins are resin. The process is similar to a bigass waffle iron running at Mach 2. There is parting compound involved in the process so that the resins will not stick to the dies. This needs to be removed prior to paint or stain being applied. A shot of dish detergent in some water and a little elbow grease is all it takes. 

The resin is dense and in some instances the doors are delivered with a factory primer. Usually in a biege color and way less sheen than what would be commonly called gloss. 

Using a bonding primer on the raw resin is a pretty good idea IMO. To flat out state that flat, matte, eggshell or in the case of Benny Moore "pearl" or the low sheen wunderbonders will not take stain is horse pucky.

Even though wiping back an embossed "grain" is not graining by any stretch, current trends in quickie graining use alkyd and waterbourne gels over several types of paints. The gels that are part stain and part alkyd poly are especially fast in the hands of an experienced craftsman. Even faster is using a dyestain tinted shellac base undercoat and the aforementioned gel/poly combo. In a demo by a real whiz this guy grained out a six panel wood door after the shellac had dried in about 15 minutes.

Was the door prepped beforehand so this guy could do the demo? Sure it was. I'm a great sander..Baby's butt is my middle name. 

Some of you guys should check out "Road Dog's" website to see what can be done with a few bucks worth of paint and some practice.


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## straight_lines (Oct 17, 2007)

There is a thread here about gel staining fiberglass with pics and step by step. To lazy to search for it..


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## LCI (Jan 2, 2009)

MNpainter said:


> ?????????????? they are designed to be stained and the a clear coat applied. or painted. Never had an adhesion problem. You may need to reconsider the products you are using. steve


That you never had an adhesion problem is great. Do what your doing, my advice is to those who don’t do many and aren’t as familiar with all the different doors, products, and or kits. I have never had failure but have gotten calls to fix them when homeowner tries to do it themselves using kit and instructions from where the door was purchased. I might add that its is only the side of the door facing outside, and getting hit with the elements that I have seen fail. So, I tint bonding primer to the color of the door and prime it. As far as I can tell, so far, it has resolved the problem. It doest really take a lot of time and can save on the embarrassment of a callback do to failure.


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## Retired (Jul 27, 2010)

LCI said:


> That you never had an adhesion problem is great. Do what your doing, my advice is to those who don’t do many and aren’t as familiar with all the different doors, products, and or kits. I have never had failure but have gotten calls to fix them when homeowner tries to do it themselves using kit and instructions from where the door was purchased. I might add that its is only the side of the door facing outside, and getting hit with the elements that I have seen fail. So, I tint bonding primer to the color of the door and prime it. As far as I can tell, so far, it has resolved the problem. It doest really take a lot of time and can save on the embarrassment of a callback do to failure.


Good call. No callbacks tells the tale and that face and the leading edge can all be treated in situ.


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## jack pauhl (Nov 10, 2008)

Problem here was base coat color. You had a chance at covering it with the ZAR wiping stain (not gel) but no color like you said... hard to believe tho since they have a huge selection in that dark tone. Feel free to mix them, like Moorish Teak with some Black onyx or similar mix.

Anyways the base should have been changed to walnut toner rather than (default) maple for future reference.

I should add... ZAR stains and the color sample on the can are very far between (actual) color in the can. You can achieve the color on the can but the stain is capable of being much much deeper and darker. The beauty of ZAR stains... you can work a range of color depth with them on the fiberglass doors.


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