Alrighty, does anyone have a thought about a thin wood sealer? What I'd like to try to do is lessen how checkering might look darker with the same finish as the rest of a stock.
craigd, most finishes that are cut with the appropriate solvent will penetrate deeper and seal the wood better. Some popular sealers are nothing more than the flagship product that is cut with thinner.
As you know, the problem with checkering is that those little diamonds contain a lot of end grain, so they naturally absorb much more stain, finish, skin oils, etc. and become darker than the surrounding wood. To a point, this is what we mostly want and expect to see in a stock. The common practice after checkering is to brush in a little thinned finish of the same brand that was used for the stock. But there is nothing to say that you can't carefully use something else that won't darken the diamonds quite as much. You might even wish to try some thinned polyurethane which often is lighter than many finishes. It may also have the added benefit of penetrating the diamonds and making them tougher and more resistant to breaking or other damage. You can even use a cyanoacrylate (crazy glue) to toughen and seal checkering diamonds in wood that is more brittle, porous, or prone to fuzzing.
Try cutting some checkering into a scrap of the same wood, and experimenting with different thinned finishes to get the effect and color you want. I'll repeat what I said earlier about my little experiment with wood glues and finishes. I tried perhaps a dozen different brands of untinted "clear" finishes. I used a gloss and a satin polurethane, Minwax oil modified urethane, Linspeed, Tru-Oil, Tung Oil, Waterlox, Watco Danish Oil, Deft, Permalyn, a couple different varnishes including some very old Sherwin Williams Spar Varnish that my Grandfather had in his basement when he died in the late 1960's, plus a couple more. The final appearance on the same piece of black walnut was somewhat different for every one of them. But as I recall, the polyurethanes I tried gave me the lightest tint.
Edit: And here's a little tip to keep all those opened cans and bottles of finish from skinning over and drying out... They sell a product called BlOxygen Finish Preserver that is simply a spray can of inert gas that is heavier than air.
https://www.jamestowndistributors.com/userportal/document.do?docId=1147 You squirt some into your can of finish or paint just before closing the lid, and being heavier than air, it displaces the oxygen that causes your finish to skin over or harden in the can. However, I realized that I have a 220 cu. ft. and a 60 cu. ft. tank of inert gas on my two MIG welder carts. I just lift the wire feed wheels and squirt a good shot of Argon-CO2 into my paint and finish cans and bottles and immediately seal them. It works great with expensive moisture cure urethane paints too.
