Have I used the wrong wood sealant, and what can I do?

I recently have been building a new vivarium for my bearded dragon, Loki (aged ~5months).
I made the vivarium out of beech plywood, and knew I needed to seal the wood. I did a bit of internet research, and it seemed that any sealant would do, so I used https://www.diy.com/departments/ronseal-garden-garden-furniture-protector-0-75l/127453_BQ.prd, as it had water protection and UV protection for the wood.

As we had an Easter weekend of warm sunny weather, I was able to apply the three coats as directed outside in the morning, bringing it in each night. Since then it has sat indoors.

However, it has now been a week since I sealed it, and it still has a smell. I didn't want to put Loki in until I knew it was ok, so I did another round of internet searching, and began worrying myself that I may have used entirely the wrong thing, and ruined all my work (as I now notice that the container has a "high 25-50% VOC" label on the back).

If I leave it a week or two longer, until the smell disappears, is it still safe to use? Or do I need to dismantle, sand and use something else? Or worse, is the wood now completely unusable?

I recently have been building a new vivarium for my bearded dragon, Loki (aged ~5months).
I made the vivarium out of beech plywood, and knew I needed to seal the wood. I did a bit of internet research, and it seemed that any sealant would do, so I used https://www.diy.com/departments/ronseal-garden-garden-furniture-protector-0-75l/127453_BQ.prd, as it had water protection and UV protection for the wood.

As we had an Easter weekend of warm sunny weather, I was able to apply the three coats as directed outside in the morning, bringing it in each night. Since then it has sat indoors.

However, it has now been a week since I sealed it, and it still has a smell. I didn't want to put Loki in until I knew it was ok, so I did another round of internet searching, and began worrying myself that I may have used entirely the wrong thing, and ruined all my work (as I now notice that the container has a "high 25-50% VOC" label on the back).

If I leave it a week or two longer, until the smell disappears, is it still safe to use? Or do I need to dismantle, sand and use something else? Or worse, is the wood now completely unusable?

You can cover it with a proper sealer as a last coat, after all it is a sealer. Be sure to sand it good before applying the last coat, there is no need to dismantle it.

What kind of sealant would be appropriate? And can I just do the inside the viv, or should I coat outside as well?

You would typically want to use something with a lower voc count mainly for your own safety lol. Hopefully you applied it in a well ventilated area.

Here's the problem with sealing over it with something else. If it's still putting off fumes, there's still a chemical process occurring and putting something over it will potentially cause 1 of two issues.
1. The two sealers won't interact at all, but your first sealer will still be off gasing and potentially cause bubbles in your top coat. Won't always happen but still a possibility when applying a different sealer before 1 fully cures.
2. The two sealers are not compatible and they end up just mixing with each other and you end up with a gooey mess that's never going to cure. Especially going from water base to oil base.

Since you've committed to this sealer already, my advice would be to just let it cure. For what it's worth I used a water based sealer which dries much quicker than oil based and it still took a week and a half + to fully cure.

I would leave it outside.
If you can mount your lights in it now I would do that too and turn them on to kinda bake the product. That's what I did.

-Brandon

Posted in your other thread.

-Brandon

I used thompsons water sealer for mine. Seems to be alright.

Okay, I'll leave it until it's finished off gassing. So you think it'll be fine for use once it's fully cured?

Yeah once it's done off gasing it will be cured and safe to use

-Brandon