A secondary benefit, however, was discovered when CPES was used for wood restoration: CPES was functioning as a high grade adhesion-promoting primer as well, and the paint/stain/varnish top coatings that had been applied were not failing as they usually did.

"(MultiWoodPrime) does just what it promises! A great product. Highly recommended. I saved all the windows in my home with it." Mae, at The Lumber Baron, Albany, CA

Thus began the specification of CPES as an adhesion-promoting primer by architects and high-end contractors. Finally, word of mouth brought many a local homeowner to the manufacturer's door, asking how and where they could buy CPES for their own home repairs.

And so goes the story of how the manufacturer of an epoxy wood restoration product surveyed its customer base and found that over 60% of the product purchased was being used as a high-end primer on brand new wood!

"I believe your (MultiWoodPrime) is the best sealer I've ever used."Bruce MacKenzie, Senior Shipwright, USS Constellation, Baltimore, MD

The chemist who originally formulated CPES had always known that it was a superior primer and why; he had not, however, realized that so many consumers were now using it solely as a primer on new wood. Bottom line, the feedback from state architects, millwork manufacturers, and people who had the opportunity to witness years of superior topcoat performance after CPES had been applied, led Smith & Co. to market their Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer as a multi-purpose-primer as well as for wood restoration. The reason: There is no primer available anywhere, not through specialty suppliers or retail outlets or any other, that functions as an adhesion promoting primer, a porosity-sealing primer, a tannin-blocking primer, an acidity-neutralizing primer and a sanding-primer, (as well as resisting long-term coating failure) all-in-one - thus the new brand name MultiWoodPrime™.

What is MultiWoodPrime?

MultiWoodPrime is a tough, flexible resin system carried into the wood by a solvent blend which dissolves the sap, oil and moisture found in wood. The resin system is derived from natural wood resin and, therefore, develops a chemical adhesive bond to the wood resin and wood fibers in the new wood. The resins from each form a bond which prevents coating adhesion failure.

The name MultiWoodPrime means what it says: it is a multi-functional primer, a claim meant to be taken by the user literally. MultiWoodPrime, in fact, performs the multiple functions of promoting topcoat adhesion, neutralizing wood acidity, sealing surface porosity, impregnating sub-surface porosity, blocking tannin bleed, resisting coating failure, and toughening up a soft surface so it can be lightly sanded.

"I have used it (MultiWoodPrime) on (boat) bottoms as well as almost everything else. It does two things very well. Firstly it soaks into the wood, gluing the grain together and taking up space so water can not. Secondly, because it is 'part of the wood' now it is the perfect 'primer' or paint base." R. W.

Because 1) the old, but still currently marketed primer formulations have not kept up with the changes effected by governmental legislation which forced topcoat manufacturers to remove key ingredients because of environmental issues, 2) no primer, old or new, was ever able to fully impregnate the porosity of old, weathered wood and new, sound wood, and 3) the quality of lumber being sold today is not the same as it was when the original primers were formulated.

Historically, a simple lead carbonate oil-based primer [White Lead] worked well on slowing-growing dense old-growth wood because the lead carbonate also functioned as a mild, but effective, fungicide. We all know government regulators removed the lead from all paint, but that wasn't all that changed. Concurrently the lumber industry developed fast-growing trees, and their wood was much more porous than the slow growing types. The industry-standard euphemism for this is "Second-growth" lumber. (In a way, it is similar to the difference between domesticated and wild animals; the wild ones are in many respects better-adapted to survive.) Lastly, latex paint replaced oil-based paint, with the latex paint manufacturers claiming their latex product could be used directly on wood as a primer, as well as a topcoat. After these three changes took place, consumers found their wood rotted more easily, paint did not prevent rot, and when rot developed under the layer of paint, the paint separated from the wood.
MultiWoodPrime, as opposed to other primers on the market, provides the ingredients needed and/or missing in common primers which fail to keep paint stuck to the wood after one or a few years. In this way MultiWoodPrime compensates for today's highly porous wood.

"(The Smith & Co. products) work! Restoring a 63 foot Alaskan Trawler, they saved me about two years and great expense. (I'd tell you to) use them-they are fantastic." Dave McGreenery

Wood impregnated with MultiWoodPrime changes the natural wood cellulose (which fungi and bacteria find tasty and easily digestible) into epoxy-impregnated cellulose, which tastes bad to them and resists further attack by fungi and bacteria. The wood is also reinforced by the gluing together of the internal and surface wood fibers, while continuing to allow the wood to breathe. As a result the wood resists the natural deterioration process which leads to paint failure, especially if the paint is a waterborne product.

New, "Second-growth" wood is similar to old, weathered wood in that it has a porosity which can absorb the vehicle-portion of some coatings, leaving the mineral-and-pigment-portion of the paint formula deposited on the surface as a brittle, mineral-packed layer. This film eventually cracks and the latex primer's seal is broken.

MultiWoodPrime will not crack. The reason MultiWoodPrime will not crack is because the very thin film of epoxy glue on the surface continues to cure after the topcoat is applied, bonding the top coat to the primer (and remember, the wood-derived resins in the MultiWoodPrime have already bonded to the natural resins in the new wood). In other words, the paint becomes glued to the wood. The glue is a flexible glue made largely from the resins of wood itself thus remains about as flexible as the natural wood.

"I would recommend your product (MultiWoodPrime) to anyone involved in repairing or maintaining anything made of wood." Andrew Maggard, Shipwright