Source
r/woodworking•
Chef_Chantier

Does heat make raw linseed oil harden quicker?

I want to use raw linseed oil as a food safe finish for some wooden spoons, but I'm not too keen of waiting days if not weeks for the oil to finish polymerising. Can i just stick in the oven at 100 or 150 C for a couple hours, assuming that the heat would make the polumerysation reaction go faster, or do will that just damage the spoons and destroy the finish? I searched the sub, and the only relevant post of someone testing this out with chopsticks, which turned out smooth and seemed durable, but it also turned black (probably in the same way cast iron seasoning turns black).

Anyone have any experience with this? Thanks in advance!

Posted Aug 26, 2021, 9:54 AM UTC

15
[deleted]•

[deleted]

2
AutoModeratorMOD•

This is a reminder to those commenting on this post (not the person that posted it): Comments not related to woodworking will be removed. Violations to rule 1 including crude jokes, innuendo, sexist remarks, politics, or hate speech may result in an immediate ban

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1
oldtoolfool•

The only answer is to get some scrap and try it, but I frankly don't think it will be satisfactory. Time and good air circulation is the best cure for linseed oil.

Having said this, whatever you use in terms of food safe oil, be it linseed, walnut, tung or mineral, any oil has to be reapplied with regularity to maintain it - which we all know that end users will not do. So I'd just bite the bullet and use mineral oil.

1
joelavOG•

The raw linseed oil curing timeline is more months than it is weeks. Like 6 months. Heat won't help. It's flaxseed oil. Unprocessed it will cure eventually, but not any time soon.

You can get food safe boiled linseed oil. Not the one with chemical dryers, the kind that has been properly boiled in a vacuum kiln. Lee Valley sells it I believe. The cure time is similar to tung oil. 30 to 90 days

1
joninleeds•

I have used both linseed and boiled linseed oil. Never again.

1
NothingButThyme•

This is pure linseed oil that will dry in about a day

They pre-polymerize it for you by vacuum boiling it

https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/tools/supplies/finishing/finishes/45105-tried-and-true-traditional-danish-oil

1