Coating for wood

We have been contacted by a local maritime museum who wants to know
how to best preserve the wooden stock of an anchor on display in
their front yard. It is oak, from an 18th or 19th century vessel
excavated in the 1970's.  It was not treated, just desalinated and
air-dried, then coated with what appears to be a tar-based product
and put on display with little or no maintenance.  The coating has
failed, and the wood is cracked, dirty, and beginning to rot. Moving
the anchor in-doors is not an option, but they will be doing
clean-up and other maintenance to remove some of the stress on the
wood.

We would like to recommend a new coating that will seal the surface
from weather and further rot--does anyone have any suggestions?  I
was particularly curious about some of the preservative solutions
sold for house restoration (they seem to be mostly consolidating
resins with fungicides?).   Or should they go with good old
Thompson's Water Seal, and perform annual maintenance?

Howard Wellman
Lead Conservator
Maryland Archaeological Conservation Laboratory
Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum
410-586-8577
Fax: 410-586-3643



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                  Conservation DistList Instance 14:48
                 Distributed: Thursday, March 22, 2001
                       Message Id: cdl-14-48-016
                                  ***