On your advice I used medium steel wool to gently remove paint "flecks" the previous owners left on the stained mantle, and bringing the surface to a clean but not bare finish. I then polished it with fine steel wool, used de-natured alcohol to clean skin oils from the one side, let dry overnight, stained with a water based varathane, that produced good results in a test spot. Have been applying thin coats of water based varathane every 24 to 48 hours, carefully dusting in between coats. The surface now has 5 thin coats and is becoming very beautiful. I picture a maximum of 10 coats. It dries incredibly quickly, hence the thin but multiple coat routine. The mantle is becoming even more gorgeous before our eyes, and the benefit of using this line of water based products has been almost no odour and no problems, even with an asthmatic child in the home.
