How to Get White Heat Marks off Wood Table
Wanna know how I know how to remove heat stains from wood???
Table of Contents
How I Got Heat Stains On My Wood Table
This afternoon I was working at the kitchen table and creating some fun personalized beach towels for our upcoming trip to Disney. I wanted a set like this for the kids, but I also don’t want to blow our souvenir budget before we even get to the Happiest Place on Earth!
Me, being my ADHD self and not wanting to take the 2-minutes to grab the ironing board, decided I could just iron on the appliques on the kitchen table….with a towel to protect the table, of course!
Well, have you ever used a wood table as an ironing board?
Yeah, it’s not a great idea!
ESPECIALLY if you’re going to use the steam setting on the iron…like I did.
Wet heat is NOT a friend to wood!
After I had been happily steaming the letters onto the towels for a good 20 minutes, it was time to clean up. But, no one could have prepared me for this sight!
I lifted up the towel to find these incredible LARGE heat stains on the wood table!!!
Yeah, I wish I could say the pictures make it look worse than it appears. I burned the crap out of my kitchen table!
I was hoping that the white discoloration would disappear as the wood dried…but they were pretty well scorched in there.
I tried everything I could think of for how to remove heat stains from wood!
Nothing worked.
Until, I read a post on Reddit about using an iron to remove heat stains from a wood table. Seriously, an iron is how I got here in the first place!
Well, as I see it the damage has already been done…what’s another go with an iron going to do?
Steps for How to Remove Heat Stains from Wood Table
Okay, so I’m diving in head first into getting these white heat marks off my wood table.
Step 1:
Clean the table thoroughly. I just wiped down the table and made sure there’s no grime that I’m possible adding to the heat stains.
Step 2:
Make sure the table is completely dry! Remember, it’s the WET heat that caused these marks in the first place.
Step 3:
Set the iron temperature to HIGH. Yep, as high as it will go!
Step 4:
Protect the table surface with a thin towel. Hmmmm….are we seeing a pattern here? I’m getting rid of the white heat marks on the wood pretty much the same way I put them there.
Just remember, WET heat is much different than DRY heat when it comes to removing heat stains from wood!
Step 5:
Iron the table in a circular motion for about 5 minutes.
Holy cow! It worked so well!! I’m going to do another round of ironing the table…but at least the white heat marks are coming off the wood table!
Step 6:
Rehydrate your wood table with Murphy’s Oil Soap. I love this stuff and use it to revive my worn out wood furniture. They didn’t pay me to post about them…I just use this oil soap for everything!
And…….TADA!!!!
You can’t even tell I destroyed the table earlier!
SCORE!!
So, if you have white scortch mark stains on wood you now know that an iron might just do the trick….although if it doesn’t work don’t come knocking on my door– I am not claiming that this will work for anyone nor am I an expert in this field…I just got REALLY REALLY REALLY lucky that I didn’t ruin our kitchen table.
