Can you stain MDF?

Just curious.

I haven't stained MDF, but I do know if you spill even a little rubbing alcohol on it (40%?), it WILL swell. I'd imagine staining it would cause the entire thing to get huge.

Plus, I'd guess stained MDF would look pretty boring, since there's no grain or anything...

cant really stain mdf, you might get some sort of colour on it but it will look terrible because, as said above there is no grain.
Cheers.

you can bondo it/ paint it. but youc an ask thes kind of questions in one thread instead of making a new one every time i know ill be checking in on your progress cause you game me the ide to make my own case as well

You can stain MDF , the one I have used in the Past is the Wattyl Stain/estapol all in one does quite a good job

Bit late to the party, but this thread caught my eye.

You can stain MDF.

In the project here, I'm using a standard dark cherry stain from Sherwin Williams. It soaks in heavy. If you go back with a brush as it dries, you can even add grain:





The stain, however, may never fully dry. I'm not sure, I left a test sample for days and it still would come up.



So seal with an oil based polyurethane. I used 2 coats of standard Home Depot oil based poly with gloss finish, and got a hard glass smooth finish:

I haven't stained MDF, but I have sealed it with oil based poly. I did about 8 light coats, and it came out perfect without any swelling.

you can stain mdf, but different stain products will give different results. I find the best way to avoid any adverse affects is to use a non grain raising spray on dye. we use it to tint the substrate to either make it darker when stain is applied, or to even out the blotchiness of maple.
stay away from water based.

you are gonna wanna put several coats of lacquer or similar though.

painting mdf is a lot of work since it wicks paint like nobodies business.

I usually seal with a vinyl sealer, prime with a post catalyzed varnish and paint with a similar tinted varnish.

if you do stain your mdf, black works exceptionally well. your edges will need to be sanded very smooth. to 400ish grit. you should then apply stains with a rag, and wipe off any excess with a clean rag.