Furniture polish, oil, wax, other treatment of wood chess pieces.

I am still unclear on the best way to protect and care for chess pieces.  I think I have read on some manufacturers sites to use no product.  Others say wax occasionally is good, liquid products are bad.  I have also read people claiming the benefits of liquid oils over polish to enhance the look and seal the surface, and to moisturize and prevent moisture loss of the pieces .  These benefits should reduce the likelyhood of cracking.  

To me, oiled wood (for decks, furniture etc) has always been a good idea, as it makes the wood water resistant, it fills pores with oil to prevent shrinkage and cracking, and holds in the natural moisture and oils of the wood, also to prevent cracking.  

I ask because I have had some cracking problems (Chess Bazaar is replacing the pieces).  I have been experimenting with the cracked pieces, filling the cracks with plastic wood, or glue/sawdust mixture, and then oiling the pieces with some Pledge wood restore with orange oil (just stuff that was laying around the house).  

The Pledge really seems to bring out the grain, add a nice shine, and also makes the very light boxwood pieces a little darker, which I think looks nice.  What could possibly be bad about using this stuff?  I want to put it on the rest of my pieces to try and ward off any further cracking.  

I heard that too.  I googled it and Murphys oil soap contains no oil.  It is soap made from pine oil.  So it seems like more of a cleaner than a revitlizing/ protective product.  

I also heard Scotts liquid gold is good.  Apparently that is basically mineral oil.  The Pledge I used is also mineral oil based, but has more ingredients than scotts liquid gold, like dimethicone, which is just a silicone for shine, and some oleate which is just some other kind of oil/wax/fat of some kind.  

The Scotts or the Pledge would theoretically do what I want, which is to add oil, prevent moisture loss, prevent cracking.  

I tried paste wax on a piece too.  I think that is a good option, but it didn't add shine or enhance color as much as the Pledge.  It is also a lot more work than wiping on a liquid.  

I've read here that others have used renaissance wax.  I've only used it so I have no other polishing methods to compare it to.  

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/renaissance-micro-crystalline-wax

Hi forked_again. There are so many opinions on it. First, after reading so many articles, etc. on cracking, I do not believe waxing helps or hurts that much.  It's weights or the expansion of the weights combined with humidity. 

If I may just try to make a guess I would say weights have 75% and humidity level 25%. I may be wrong but Frank Camerata didn't patent his fairly new proprietary weighting system for fun. If you ask him I would think he would agree that the weights have everything to do with cracking. Yes, the humidity works to shrink and expand but it is shrinking and expanding around the weights and somehow he found a way to avoid this. I do believe he only uses that on his most expensive sets as it is costly but you would have to ask Frank himself.

if you put an oil on a more or less impermeable finish like most of the modern finishes are it will soak through gaps and pores and cracks and potentially darken the wood around those imperfections making them more obvious.  Thats probably why some manufacturers recommend not using it.  If you're lucky and there aren't any, or it soaks through evenly enough it will look nice, but probably only make the piece temporarily more shiny on the existing surface. 

I'm not sure that there is a good way to stop moisture moving in and out of the wood, most approaches involve storing wooden objects in a constant humidity environment rather than trying to get a perfect seal (can you seal the base of the piece?  thats where most of the movement will happen, moisture moves in and out of the end-grain more than it moves sideways and the bases are often not really sealed).  A coat on the surface is probably not going to stop movement and soaking the pieces would make them oily. 

If Pledge works for you thats great, but it may not solve all of your problems.  When manufacturers talk about revitalising etc they mean making the finish shiny not actually affecting the wood itself (getting something into the wood would take a long time). 

The wood that the pieces are made from is likely to be kiln dried (its cheaper), which moves more than air dried wood does, and cracking is a possibility as the pieces adjust to their environment, but the tendency to crack will get less over time unless you live somewhere with very large (and long) swings in humidity.  

Frank used to own HOS and still is involved as far as I know with the expensive sets, he designs and invents as in the proprietary weighting system, but I may be wrong.  He used to be on the forums here at one time. He still may or may not read them. Would be nice if he would respond to this thread on preventing cracking. The problem with his weighting system is that it is labor-intensive I believe, not sure, and would add a lot to an ordinary set where no one would buy it. Just my guess. But if you were in the market and money was not a factor you would want a set that would not be prone to cracking, at least I would. 

Frank is the founder of the House Of Staunton and an expert on antique chess sets of all kinds. If I'm not mistaken, he developed the classifications for chess sets based on the knights (Cook, Morphy, Marshall, etc.) So he knows his stuff and his opinions should probably be given a lot of weight. Unlike mine, unfortunately, I'm mostly just a babbler.

Oops, I see the question has been answered. I told you I was just a babbler. :-)

He also designed the Sinquefield Cup sets, which are basically antique Jaques design with modernized Knight designs.

I do use renaissance wax on my chess sets and other things also. You can use this stuff on a whole bunch of things that are made from other than wood.  I figure if it is good enough for museims it's good enough for the junk around my house 

I have no idea where I read this but I think his patent involved using different sized metal pellets instead of solid discs.  The  pellets can move when constricted by the wood.

I will add that you can be granted a patent without showing that your idea actually works.  The main criteria is that no one has thought of it before you.

It seem like a logical solution.  It is no surprise he charges a premium for it.  Regardless of whether or not it is more labor intensive.  It is a marketing tool, and he is a business man after all.

I remember seeing the picture of the patent, someone on here may have even posted it. It was much more elaborate than pellets. 

A good furniture polish is just fine for general shine,but as long as the mfgr has used good woods(debatable with some of them)the best thing one can do is keep a safe humidity level in the room where the pieces are stored.I have a small in room cool mist humidifier that goes into use during cold months.The warm mist units put out a white dust that is messy.Portable cool mist units are very effective.....Vornado makes ones that are effective and "work" for long periods......Good luck.

Here is the patent.  It involves using powdered Tugsten.  It makes sense that would add cost.  Tungsten is very dense so less would be needed, but it is a lot more expensive than steel.  

https://patents.google.com/patent/US20160059115

Thanks for your input.  That makes sense why mnufacturers might discourage using such products.  Uneven absorption and then the customer is not happy with the look.  

Good points also about moisture loss through the bottom of the piece as well.  Even if oil, wax or polish won't seal as I would like, it still makes a nice shine, and nice look to the wood.  

I really just didn't want to do any harm to the wood, but I don't think its a concern.  Thinking about it, these products are for wood furniture, which is usually a lot more expensive than chess pieces, so it wouldn't make sens that these products would harm wood pieces.  

That's for the DGT sensor too. The one I remember seeing was just for weighting the chess piece and I believe the piece had to be carved out a certain way. Then yes he used tungsten but I did not think this set was DGT enabled at all.  I guess Frank might be the only one that would know for sure unless Shawn also does. 

Yeah that's the best method, but my plan was to leave this set out on the table all the time.  

Whenever you open the box you'll replace the air, so you need to only open the box when the humidity is not too far off the moisture content of the timber.  Opening it on a really rainy, 100% humidity for example, day would trap extra moisture in the box.   

You just contradicted yourself, no?

No because once you chemically react the pine oil, it is no longer oil.  Like in the old days of making soap with beef fat and lye,  there is no beef fat remaining in the final lye soap product.  The reaction creates a sodium salt of the fatty acids in the fat.  This completely changes the property of the material (as you can clearly see the difference between a lump of fat and a bar of soap).  The reaction is called saponification and it makes soap a good cleaner by being soluble in water while at the same time able to mix with fats. 

Sorry I'm a chemical engineer

I leave my sets out all the time.Actually,I rotate them under an acrylic dust cover.The small/in-room humidifier works great,as long as the room is not too large.You can use in box humidity packets as well,but they wear out and I like to know my humidity is always in the safe zone.An inexpensive hygromoter is a good thing as well.