Expert: Eileen Cronk - 1/14/2009

Question
I'm having alot of fun remodeling my bathroom, and i currently purchased a new sink. It has a dark stain on it that i love and i want to restain all my trim to match. I've pulled it all down and I'm stuck... whats my next step? I've been reading i should remove the old stain with a chemical? Then I've seen stuff about striping it... that the same as using a chemical? others I've seen said i should hand sand all my trim. I'm not too worried about matching it to my sinks stain cus i figure thats just trial and error and i have alot of extra trim to test on that i won't be putting back up. Electric sander would be bad? and then what type of sand paper should i use? course first? I'm new to this lol... might just go buy new trim and stain it that way. But i would like to save a lil money and use the trim i have.
Next thing i ask is after im ready to stain do i just use a stain then let that dry and then a varnish and then im done? don't some things take more than one coat?
Oh lol whats the diffrence in stains.. gel? and so on? does it matter for what im doing?
I hope you get some time to answer my questions and thanks for any time you take to do so ^.^/   Thank you!

Answer
Hi Christopher
Nice to hear from you.
I'll try to answer all your questions as asked.
You have all the trim off now and thats great because the next step is stripping it of all existing finish. Get a can of MC stripper for this (ask at the hardware) and follow directions on can.
Sanding off a finish will not allow a proper stain job.
Here is the stripper I use.
http://www.swingpaints.com/1800.htm
If you use this stripper there is no other surface prep necessary including sanding.
So no need to sand at all.
After the staining, and drying of stain (overnight), two coats of a poly clear coat are applied. Then you're done.
The type of stain you choose depends on the wood it is going to be applied to.
Start with a Minwax oil stain. If you feel its not taking to the wood dark enough, then try the gel stain.
Chris if you need the full stripping info just ask and any problems you run into ask also.
I'm here every evening.
Regards
Eileen