I refinished this cabinet using ML Campbell conversion varnish, which our shop uses consistently and has never had problems with. Lightly sanded the piece, wiped it down with MEK, sprayed. Looked great when delivered. Homeowner left it in her garage in Florida for a week or two then shipped it to her son in Maryland, where it still looked great until about 2 months later where it developed the haze in the photo below. I have no idea what it is or why it would take so long to develop. Any thoughts on what might have caused this or how to address it would be appreciated.

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I bet you put the CV over a lacquer sealer or finish that had zinc stearate in it. This is a Stearate Boom looks like to me. If you wipe off the dust, does it come back in 2-3 days?

Brian, Yes the haze reappears after it is wiped off. I read on another thread that a wipe down with a solvent might resolve the problem - do you know if this might work and what type of solvent to use? Thanks.

Solvent will not work, the stearate will keep migrating to the surface. You can try a scuff sand and sealing it with shellac to see if the stearate migrates through, and if it does, then you'll have to strip it down and start over.

What brand of sandpaper did you use?

I've never heard of stereate causing trouble, except for years ago and waterborne finishes.

The catalyst in the CV (and most precats) likes to bond (oxidize) with zinc stearate (being a metal) more than the synthetic resins in the CV, so this reaction forces the zinc stearate to migrate to the surface.

Adam, we use Mirka sandpapers, not sure if this was what you were asking for or a more specific product.
Brian, the CV we used was a post cat, not precat.

Thank you both for the input.

I know it was a post cat, but it doesn't make any difference, both precats and post-cats will do this when they are used over a product that has zinc stearate in it.

Always use products that are compatible!
@Brian
If you wipe it off,are you really removing some stearate? Or it just goes away for a while and then comes back?
Just wondering how long will it do this if you keep on wiping?or it never does?

I had a cabinet door come into my shop (1 of 150 doors and 80 drawers...stain, sealer, shaded with dye/ sealer then 2 top coats of SW water-white CV) that looked just like that. It wasn't my job but the homeowners were hoping that l could come up with why it did this and how to fix it. I never could figure out why but the formaldehyde out-gassing of that 1 cab door would fill my 16'×16'×12' with the odor...I can't imagine what the house smelled like. The how I came up with was to replace the lot, that said I did sand the one door well with 320, spray on 2 very light coats of Seal Coat then 1 coat of SW F3 formaldehyde free CV and for the 2 months it sat in my shop it looked great but the formaldehyde odor never stop eminating from it.
Brian!, thank you for a most likely answer as to why.

@mastercabman, it’s stearate, and yes, so long as there’s acid and stearate in the film, migration appears to not stop. We’ve seen this far more on refinish jobs than new work for obvious reasons.

@nick, what you’ve seen on that one door sounds more like an over catalyzed finish, this will present itself as an oily haze that wipes off and returns, but also makes the finish smell like vomit. In this case, replacement is cheaper than refinishing.

The sandpaper is not the problem. We were having the stereate wb problem 15 years ago and switched to Mirka. The Mirka gold and 3m gold are calcium stereate. The white papers like 3m frecut and Klingspor were zinc back then.

It looks like someone wiped part of the surface with some contaminate during the finishing process. If it was stearate then there would be more consistent hazing across the whole surface.

Have you seen this cabinet in person? If I saw this photograph without explanation I would guess someone wiped the cabinet with something that attacked the finish.