I bought a twenty year-old house here in southern Japan last year. The previous owner didn't really do much in the way of maintenance. I want to give all the exterior wooden beams and posts a fresh coat of stain. On the side of the house which receives the worst weather, any previous stain is all but gone and the wood (I believe Japanese red-cedar or maybe pine) is now dry and grey. There is even some spots of green algae (which I intend to remove with a 3:1 mix of bleach and a sponge). On the other sides of the house, the previous stain is there in places but still looks old and worn. My Internet research tells me that you can apply water-based stain over oil-based stain, but not the other way around. I can't be sure what the previous owner coated it with though. I really don't want to have to strip all the previous stain off if I can help it as it would be a huge job. If I go ahead and just apply water-based stain on the assumption that the previous owner put oil-based on before, will this be okay? Are there any downsides to using water-based as opposed to oil-based stains? I intend to re-stain the wood probably every spring (at least for the first few years, due to its dryness). The stain I am looking at costs about $300 for 18 litres, so I don't want to waste money by screwing things up. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks. via /r/DIY http://ift.tt/2Fvokmr
