Bar Finishing

I am in the process of finishing the basement and will be building a bar for down there this weekend. Looking at the various finishing products, I think I am going to use the Behlen's Rock Hard Table Top Varnish for the bar top. Has anyone used this? Or does anyone have good experience with a different product they would recommend? The top will be Oak Ply with an oak bar rail.

Thanks!

i haven't used that, but i did use envirotex lite, it's a two part polymer, and it is great. it pours out like molasses, and spreads nicely, and hardens to plastic. i covered my bar top in bottlecaps, and used the envirotex lite over the caps, and it looks really good.
check out my build here. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/my-bar-build-tracking-my-progress-here-121928/

the "finished" photos are on towards the last pages of the thread.

+1 for epoxy on bar tops.

I was going to use the envirotex lite but found a comparable product locally that they mis-quoted me a price that was cheaper than the envirotex. They realized they screwed up but still honored the quoted price.
The product I used is called "Orca 1100 UV Stable" epoxy from Fiberlay but i dont think it is on their website yet.

Damn, that reminds me I need to update pics for my bar build.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/bar-finally-under-construction-100022/

rbarr110 - are you using it over something like chainsaw did? I am not really looking to do that (though we did consider it for a bunch of coasters we have) so probably would need only enough for 1/16th inch layer or something probably I would guess? Can a bar rail/chicago rail whatever be covered with this? Wouldn't it just run off the edge?

ive seen it used over bare wood, tile, etc. you just have to use it in quantities that you want to achieve your desired thickness. also you can build/trim a "dam" around it, or you can simply let it drip/run over the edge of your top, or use duct tape to form a bit of an edge to it. it's pretty versatile, and works wonders in an array of applications.

SHF said:

rbarr110 - are you using it over something like chainsaw did? I am not really looking to do that (though we did consider it for a bunch of coasters we have) so probably would need only enough for 1/16th inch layer or something probably I would guess? Can a bar rail/chicago rail whatever be covered with this? Wouldn't it just run off the edge?

Click to expand...

I used it over some ceramic tiles. I put it 1/8" thick and yes let it run over the edges of my wood trim that was used as a dam. I filled it and let it run over the edge, but had a defined area masked off with the blue painters tape and during the intial hour of curing used a poly brush to clean up the drips. When the dripping stopped, I removed the tape before the epoxy totally set up.

You can use the epoxy like a varnish, brush it on thick and it self levels and you get a mirror like finish thats equal to 6 plus coats of varnish. If you do it like a varnish, practice on some "finished" scrap to get an idea how it finishes out. There are tons of youtube like videos that show how-to's for finishing wood table tops.

EDIT: I actually have to do another 1/16" flood coat since my bar is "L" shaped, I couldnt get the all surfaces completely level, so where some of the epoxy flowed over, it ended up slightly short of flowing over in spots, so I need to re-level in another direction and flood coat the whole top again to get it to my anal retentive standards.

I used Parks Super Glaze on mine, but it's the same kinda stuff, a two part epoxy that pours on really thick. I used some painters tape to line the edge of the bar and spread it on. Works like a charm and the tape comes right off as long as you remove it before its fully cured.