What wood and paint

[stevebuk]

we are having an animal farm built on the side of the garden centre where i work, containing pigs, cows, chickens, rooster, ducks, geese,rabbits, ect. I want to make some animal puzzles for the kids to play with, what wood and wood paint can you recomend, and would you varnish after painting..

[DWSudekum]

A fairly good set of questions. What wood to use is fairly easy.

we are having an animal farm built on the side of the garden centre where i work, containing pigs, cows, chickens, rooster, ducks, geese,rabbits, ect. I want to make some animal puzzles for the kids to play with, what wood and wood paint can you recomend, and would you varnish after painting.

Wood:
In order for the puzzles to stand up to usage of small children a hard wood such as Maple or Poplar would do the trick nicely.

Paint:
Laytex, Acryllic would work well for the paint. Easy to apply and easy to cleanup and fairly nontoxic ( compaired to oil based paints ) for the most part.

Finish:
This is much harder as you are dealing with children that might possibly eat the finish. I would not use a varnish as it is harder to maintain than say a good quality polyeuathane. They do make some good water based ones. Might want to think about something like a rubbing oil such as Tung, Danish, or Linseed.

Would be interested in seeing them when they are compete.


DW

[Bill Wilson]

Maple and poplar are twp good choices for the wood. Don't know about paint, but consider topcoating them with shellac.

[stevebuk]

hmmm didn't think of acrylic, thanks guys, will hav a go at cutting some out and painting them.

[I-saw]

If they are small puzzles to be played with on a table, birch ply seems like the obvious choice as it's easy to cut & strong.

Acrylic paint dries to a nice finish on birch ply as I've used it before. I didn't use any varnish on top of the paint.

[Gill]

If the puzzles you're making are quite chunky, you can probably get away with using banana pine from a DIY shed. If they're going to be smaller, any wood that would be suitable for food use would do. I'd be wary of using plywood because kiddies have a tendency to catch rough edges on their clothes and you wouldn't be popular with mummy.

When it comes to painting, acrylic is the way to go. I suggest you prime the wood first with an acrylic primer/undercoat which will make the paint go further and give a good finish. You can get big pots of acrylic paint quite cheaply from most toy shops and your local branch of Hobbicraft. If you want to make the finish more durable, you'll be able to find a whole range of finishing aerosols too. They have to conform with EU safety regulations, so any of them will be safe. Varnish tends to 'yellow' the paint and flake after a while, so it's probably not a good choice.

Gill

[Tor]

Originally Posted by DWSudekum

Wood:
In order for the puzzles to stand up to usage of small children a hard wood such as Maple or Poplar would do the trick nicely.

I would suggest maple as being good, although I think of poplar as being a soft wood (I am fully aware of the botanical classification). If they bite it, maple will stand up longer than poplar. To test this, try digging your thumbnail into maple, then try poplar and not the difference.

Tor

[JohnB]

G'day Steve,
I make my childrens puzzles using 6mm MDF with a 3mm MDF backing.
Paint with water based acrylics, 2 coats.
Then cover them with 2 coats of gloss lacquer.

Oil based Poly's will tend to yellow any white you have. Water based won't, so a couple of coats water based gloss poly over the top will seal them nicely and allow the puzzles to be cleaned.
Being that they will be a "Community Puzzle" this is important.

I made a heap of puzzles for my wife when she started teaching Kindy about 10 years ago and they are all still in use and looking pretty good.

Hope this gives you a hand.

[stevebuk]

thanks guys, loads of information to got at there, all writen down and noted. I have 6mm MDF to hand so will give that a go, and Gill, do i ask for bannana pine, must admit, i've never heard of it.
Once again, thanks..

[Gill]

Hi Steve

MDF will probably be okay but much will depend on the ages of the children. It shouldn't be harmful but bearing in mind that the dust from MDF is toxic, I'd be wary of using it if there's a possibility of the kiddies sticking pieces in their mouths. Another thought is that MDF is little more than glorified cardboard and won't wear well. You'll find it doesn't give such a good finish with the acrylic paint either unless you're prepared to use a couple of coats of undercoat/primer; it soaks up paint like an Irish navvy soaks up mugs of tea and the cut edges can be rather coarse.

Perhaps I shouldn't have used the phrase banana pine. There is a type of wood called parana pine which is better quality than the stuff sold in DIY sheds, generally being more stable and knot free. This makes it a good choice for shelving, skirting boards (base boards) and suchlike. The sort of pine you buy in DIY sheds tends to be packaged in plastic wrap and looks to be straight until it's removed from the wrap. Than it miraculously springs into the shape of a wooden banana, hence the derisory nickname, banana pine, which is word play on the name parana pine. However, if you're just going to be cutting small sections out of these boards to make jigsaws, it should be fine.

Gill