What kind of coverage can you expect with Sun Frog Products?

As for coverage, it really depends on the type of wood you have, its age, how much weather it’s been exposed to over time, and whether it has been sealed in the past and how frequently.  Soft woods (Cedar, Redwood, Southern Pine) are more porous and permeable and will accept more sealer than hardwoods (Mahogany, Pelowan, Balau, Belene, Iron Wood, Ipe, Alaskan Yellow Cedar).  Douglas Fir, Hemlock and other woods commonly used to make "treated lumber" (due to their low natural decay resistance) are somewhat in between. 

Here's an "expectation table", sealer usage gallons per square foot in New, Old But Maintained and, Old  format:
                                 

Coverage	New Decks	Old but Maintained Decks	Old Decks
Hardwoods	400	300	200
Treated Woods	350	250	175
Soft Woods	250	225	150
* Square Feet of coverage per gallon

There are some keys to remember when using the above guidelines. 

First, preparation is important.  Sun Frog is an oil system and water and oil don't associate, therefore you want your wood to be DRY when sealer is applied.  Think about Thanksgiving dinner.  You want to be hungry when you sit down to eat.  Sealing damp wood or wood seemingly dry at the surface but high in moisture below will not achieve great long term results as our oils will not soak in well and your seal will not last as long or look as rich while it does last.  Give new woods a reasonable drying-out period, 30 reasonably dry days on green (water laden) new decks, 5 to 10 or so dry days for existing, older decks. 

Second, seal clean, open wood only.  The better your deck looks before it's sealed, the better it will look after it's sealed.  Dirt, mildew and weathered sealer is not what you want to seal in, so the general rule is to clean, and possibly brighten, first.  If your deck has been sealed with other products, even Sun frog
previously, for best results we recommend cleaning with a strong cleaner to get down to clean, bare, porous wood. This way, when dry, your sealer will soak INTO  the wood as well as possible and not just dry on top as a coating. When your wood protects the sealer and your sealer protects the wood, this is the best combination.  Exterior surface COATINGS that suffer standing water and direct overhead sunlight are maintenance time-bombs.  Plus they don't look  natural, in most people’s opinion, which is one of the benefits of having a natural wood deck in the first place.

Third is application.  Sun Frog is a sealer designed to protect and beautify from WITHIN the wood, not from on top of it.  Penetration is important, which goes to preparation above.  Once your wood is clean and dry, it will be penetrable (thirsty) to our oils.  Place a good wet quantity of Sun Frog on your wood with a brush or stain pad and if the wood really soaks it up, give it more, working it into the wood with the pad or brush and moving excess on.  We don't recommend rollers except on extremely dry, thirsty woods, as they frequently just slather an excess on and don't work the product into the wood.  And while our product physically sprays well, and this is easy for initial placement if not over sprayed onto surfaces not desirous of being sealed, for health hazard reasons (breathing sealer oils as mists, fogs or liquids can result in serious, permanent damage to lung tissue, as well as other consequences not good) we do not recommend spraying and, if sprayed, recommend use of NIOSH approved respirator. The intent should be to get as much sealer INTO THE WOOD, leaving as little liquid excess on top, as possible, so as to satiate the wood's natural design for moving liquid through its structure.  When the oils get INTO the wood in this way it results in an aesthetic enhancing appearance. An analogy is appropriate here.  Compare your clean, dry wood to an open auditorium of empty chairs.  Fill these chairs with oils and after they are dry and the next wave of liquids (water) comes along, there is standing room only.  Your wood’s thirst for moisture will have been satiated with aesthetically enhancing oils.

When applying our sealer, give the wood only what it will absorb and, if you apply a second application, only do so within an hour or two of the first application.  In either event, for best results lightly buff down surface with an old shirt or towel after two or so  hours of dry time to remove any liquid excess that didn't penetrate.  We compare this to "bussing the table" after Thanksgiving dinner.  Removing any liquid excess that didn't penetrate will speed dry time, remove slow drying oils that otherwise might track into your home or pick up dirt when left ON TOP of your wood. Not removing this excess will result in formation of a COATING which will deteriorate in an unsightly manner as it decays on top of your wood over time.  After a year your Thanksgiving dinner wouldn’t look very good on your table
if you didn’t bus it.

Important:  Oily rags can spontaneously combust if not disposed of correctly so wet them with water after usage, place an air tight plastic bag and dispose of them correctly (“in accordance with local regulations”).

GUIDE: Getting as much into your wood as possible will while leaving as little excess ON TOP of your wood as possible, will make your deck LOOK the best, WEATHER the best, and leave it EASIEST TO CLEAN AND REDO the next time your deck needs, in YOUR opinion, to be redone.

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How long will Sun Frog last? 

If done right, longer than otherwise.  How long our sealer lasts for each customer is first a function of how much direct sun your deck gets and how much standing water it is exposed to over long periods of time.  Secondly, it is a function of how good you want your deck to look.  A year is a long
time where you get long standing water in winter and hot summer sun.  The surface of your deck will show tire (what weathers first, weather worst, much like the front hood of a car frequently driving in sandstorms) usually after a year on new decks (remember, your trying to preserve a cut up tree, now exposed in conditions it didn't evolve to tolerate).  On older decks well sealed, two years is much more usual.   

To make a sealer stronger, if possible, usually would only resinify it in a way, in our opinion, that looks unnatural and only sets you up for long term aesthetic dissatisfaction with your wood, to say nothing of the maintenance headaches associated with redo when IT tires!  Sun Frog’s sealers we think last excellently when compared to other products.  Remember, though, that your seal starts weathering day one.  By day 365 or 730, don’t expect it to look brand new.  When it is tired, it is time to re do it.  The winning horse usually wins by a length or two, not by a lap.  We think Sun Frog will be at or near the front of the pack, all things considered.

Rule:  Maintenance of an exterior natural wood deck is a reality.  You have them usually for a reason (lifestyle enhancement or architectural necessity). Maintain them with a product that looks excellent and can be redone easily in not-unreasonable time sequence.  Our advice is generally:  Don't paint decks.  Don't varnish or resinify decks.  Use solid body stains only if periodic sealing and maintenance is more
work and expense than its benefits to you, knowing that stains need redoing periodically (though less frequently) also and are expensive and labor intensive to undo.

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What do Sun Frog Products contain?

In order to preserve to some extent the benefit of our work and experience to ourselves to date, we have to be somewhat proprietary here.  In broad category we contain:

1) a clear, odor less petroleum based mineral oil to satiate the wood's thirst for liquid with an ingredient that moisturizes the wood long term,

2) two excellent drying oils that, combined with the nondrying oil above, form a semidrying compound that achieves positive dry at the surface but a less dry combination deeper in your wood, helping the surface and top few hundredths of an inch to be buffered from the elements of weather above it,

3) a low but not odorless petroleum based naphtha solvent to thin the other oils such that when applied
the liquid combination achieves better penetration and placement in and under the surface and less predominantly on it. This solvent evaporates out of the surface sealer usually within the first three to four days. A slight odor may be noticeable during that time, particularly if your deck is enclosed in some manner from airflow breezes.

4) An effective broad spectrum mildewcide to discourage mildew growth on the sealer ingredients.  We are not a “wood preservative”.

5) Transparent oxide pigmentation to aesthetically enhance the color of your seal, which is like a “finish” at the surface of the wood. Our colors are closely “simulative” in recreating the "natural color" of certain typical woods (Cedar Tone = Goldish color, Redwood Tone = Reddish color, Mahogany Tone = Brownish Red color, Clear = little color change other than what takes place by the effect of the oils themselves).  These also have U.V. absorption properties that help provide a sunscreen-like benefit, protecting, to a limited extent, the oils of the sealer and the wood itself from more substantial otherwise U.V. energy degradation.  A "free-radical light stabilizer" is also added for additional U.V.
protective benefit.  Both of these, while useful, are of only limited value in a penetrating, non-film
forming, non-surface coating formulation.  Consider them SPF 8’s, not SPF 30’s.  The industry largely over-hyped their effectiveness in penetrating wood sealer/stains, in our opinion.

6) Additional elements such as driers to accelerate surface dry speed and de-foamers to aid in manufacturing and application issues are also added. 

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How Toxic/Safe are Sun Frog Products?

Our Material Safety Data Sheets are on our web site and available for your review and download.

We believe our products are safe when used for the purposes intended and in accordance with their label directions.  They are all toxic if inhaled or ingested and they should not be used or left in a manner which will result in such.  Incidental skin contact should be rinsed off as soon as possible upon exposure since our active ingredients are not water and our skin or other human tissues are not designed to beneficially tolerate exposure to concentrations of these active ingredients.  However, label prescribed application
procedures and safety measures (Apply carefully to intended surfaces only. Rinse deck and surrounding garden well with water after use of our Deck Cleaner and Born Again product. For our sealers, do not breathe vapors or mists; do not ingest; wear protective clothing such as gloves and eye-protective glasses (this applies to all of our products); do not over apply; remove non-penetrating excesses after a few hours of application; etc., all enumerated on our labels) provide adequate human interface protection such that, in our opinion, our products are safe for use and enjoyment after application.  When used in accordance with label directions we believe they are also safe for the surrounding garden,  for the environment generally, and for interface with pets. Our products should not be accidentally or intentionally spilled into water supplies or streams or dumped onto the ground.

During the period of application and the initial surface dry time of our sealer (24 to 48 hours), sealed surfaces should be pet and foot-traffic free.

Again, our Material Safety Data Sheets are available on our website for review and download.

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Maintain an Existing Deck || Frequently Asked Questions