Kitchen Cabinets

[MikeDingas]

I need some advice on restoring the luster to our kitchen cabinets. They are oak and are looking rather drab. I don't want to refinish or take them down. Any helpful suggestions would be appreciated.

[workin for wood]

clean them with something like citra-shine to get all the grease off them...scrub them down really good and rinse well. Buy a bottle of restore a finish. Test it behind a door and see if it works with your present finish, and if so, go nuts. Do a search for that product, it's really amazing, but only works on certain finishes. If you have older cabinets, you're more likely to succeed.

[MacS]

Mike,

Changes are you have a build up of all kinds of residue from normal dust to cooking oils, polishes, waxes, etc.

In fact no matter what you put on you can't get it to shine, you first need to clean off all that residue, to do this you need a "dewaxer". Which basically is Mineral Spirits / Paint Thinners , they are both the same solvent with just a different name.

You need some old soft cloth and some paper towels, cover the sink, conters. ect. Take the solvent and wet the cloth or the towels, and then rub one door at a time, you will see the wet cloth removing the dirt and residue, once the cloth is dirty, switch over to a clean one, keep scrubbing until that cloth is clean. Then you will know the residue has been removed.

After you clean all the cabinet doors and drawers, allow the them to dry , then you may want to apply a thin coat of a paste wax, or a cream polish that don't contain any silicones.

You should not wax or polish your cabinets more then once every 6 months.

Good luck