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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 11:46 am
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Gosh, well the stuff I'm learning here. Thanks all! :D

guitslinger wrote:
Maybe Ceri is The Stig's alter ego and he's off racing Ferraris and Lambos.

Yep, that's the one for sure. :lol: Anyhow, home again now, so...

This is where we got to:
Image

That's the bod with the stain sanded back to reveal the grain. My sanding left one or two spots needing touching up, which is easily done with some leftover stain (saved for the purpose) and a fine brush. The slightly sanded through spot by the tip of the brush, for example:
Image

Also the sanding left some colored dust in the pores of the wood which needs carefully taking off, without further interfering with the red stain nearby:
Image

A little delicate work with a small piece of sandpaper deals easily with that.

Now a little effect of my own. I'm going for a sort of "stone washed jeans" look to this stain, so after sanding it I am now rubbing at it with a gentle circular motion with a little pad of tissue, to lift off more of the loose pigment and drive the rest further into the grain; generally giving a softer, more worn look to the top:
Image

You won't find that in any of the finishing books, but I like it. PRS give a slightly similar look to some of their pale blues, though I don't know if they achieve it the same way.

Technical stuff: for those as don't know, stain is simply pigment (in the form of tiny particles) suspended in water or spirit (water in my case). The liquid is a "carrier" and serves to distribute the pigment evenly on the surface before evaporating.

Paint/lacquer has a third element; the "binder". Cellulose in nitrocellulose lacquer, oil in oil paint, gum in watercolor paint... whatever. It is the bit that sticks the pigment to the surface and creates a permanent film.

That is missing with a stain, so what we are left with so far is simply a dry particulate clinging to the fibres of the wood. Mechanical action will keep a lot it there, but imperfectly. So we need to do something to stick it in place. For that I shall be using vinyl sealer - which is used by a huge part of the guitar finishing world, though as usual deprecated by Ed Roman. So it must be good.

Vinyl sealer performs several functions. It fixes the stain in place. It stops the stain leaching upwards into whatever finish is coming next. It creates a waterproof seal on the surface of the wood so that we can continue applying our waterbased finish without worrying about the moisture affecting the glue joins in the timber. And it inhibits the sinking of lacquer solvents wastefully into the wood, which saves on lacquer and means we can construct our finish thinner - and quicker. All good reasons almost everyone uses it.

I could buy some vinyl sealer "loose" to put through my spraygun. But it so happens I have some aerosols of the stuff handy, so I might as well do it that way:
Image

That's Behlen's vinyl sealer, which conveniently I can buy straight from the manufacturer where I live. Incidentally, you may be able to see a dark smudge just to the right of the output jack cavity in that last picture. A disadvantage of working outdoors is little contributions like that from birds flying overhead. I was worried a tiresome cleanup and consequent restaining would have to take place after that, but fortunately it vanished after some careful dabbing with naphtha and denatured spirit.

Still, if the finish is falling off in that spot in a few years time we'll know why! Maybe another good, if unexpected, benefit of the sealer will be to save us from that...

Anyroadup: after a couple of thin coats of vinyl sealer the body now looks like this. See how the sealer has added a little depth to the color, compared with the first pic on this post:
Image

And one more shot:
Image

Looks more and more like a guitar, don't it? Yet again, be clear this is not how the finished instrument will look. I don't want a pink Strat - I'd have to put a "Hello Kitty" sticker on it... This is just a step on the road.

As usual, we'll leave that sealer to dry overnight and then turn our attention to the back of the body.

Cheers - C


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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 12:20 pm
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Hey Ceri,
You should start a "How Ceri Does It" Thread...really you should! This stuff you are doing here is top shelf. It's great to read all of this stuff and learn it in the process...Thanks Ceri :D

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 12:43 pm
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Thanks C! Very informative...like taking an online class in guitar finishing. Wow a bird pooped on this? LOL! You can tell people a few years from now Hey, see that spot right there! Thanks again for your time and effort in doing this for the Forum.

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 1:54 pm
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Old Ed's world famous I see, or is it infamous. :?

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 2:30 pm
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Hey C, how do you know some much about Ed Roman and what he does? I remember seeing his website several years ago...but it has been a long time now since I visited it.

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 3:26 pm
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Xhefri wrote:
Hey C, how do you know some much about Ed Roman and what he does? I remember seeing his website several years ago...but it has been a long time now since I visited it.

Heehee! I must admit I'd never heard the name of Ed Roman till I arrived on this Forum. Then I heard him being quoted as a sage on timber, finishing and the like and so tracked down several of his online writings and some of his, um, unusual YouTube vids.

I must say, far as I can see his outfit makes absolutely beautiful guitars, and in the end that is all that really matters, right? And he's certainly a colorful character.

But I do think he talks absolute twaddle about things like grain filler, tonewood, sealer and such. We sometimes wonder where some of the internet voodoo folklore about such things comes from - I've seen Ed Roman quoted often enough to know he's the source for a fair bit of it.

He also has a bizarre down on some other makers, particularly Paul Reed Smith. As it happens, the finishing of PRS guitars is often not to my taste - the wood and staining are too brash for my personal preference. That means nothing: PRS have massively raised the bar in those areas and deserve huge praise for it. Why Ed Roman seems to get so fanatically angry over them just leaves me laughing in bewilderment.

Whatever - it's all good clean fun, ain't it? :D

See y'all tomorrow - C


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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 4:20 pm
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Ceri wrote:
We sometimes wonder where some of the internet voodoo folklore about such things comes from ... But I do think he talks absolute twaddle about things like grain filler, tonewood, sealer and such. We sometimes wonder where some of the internet voodoo folklore about such things comes from - I've seen Ed Roman quoted often enough to know he's the source for a fair bit of it


ya it should be all clean fun. I remember some things on his website years ago that seemed kind of brash. I started writing some thought and then stopped and thought I should ask you what you mean by "We sometimes wonder where some of the internet voodoo folklore about such things comes from.." What is voodoo folklore? I was wondering as a few nights ago I was thinking about starting a thread about the "Myth and Magic of the Stratocaster Guitar"

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 4:35 pm
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this is looking great ceri.


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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 5:26 pm
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Ceri wrote:


He also has a bizarre down on some other makers, particularly Paul Reed Smith. As it happens, the finishing of PRS guitars is often not to my taste - the wood and staining are too brash for my personal preference. That means nothing: PRS have massively raised the bar in those areas and deserve huge praise for it. Why Ed Roman seems to get so fanatically angry over them just leaves me laughing in bewilderment.

Whatever - it's all good clean fun, ain't it? :D

See y'all tomorrow - C

Except...

He had to settle with ernie ball because he was faking some Petrucci signature guitars:
http://www.ernieball.com/forums/music-m ... ement.html

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 5:27 pm
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Xhefri wrote:
What is voodoo folklore? I was wondering as a few nights ago I was thinking about starting a thread about the "Myth and Magic of the Stratocaster Guitar"


Voodoo folklore? Well: "thinner lacquer allows the body to breathe." "Nitro gives better tone than polyester or urethane." "Heavier wood is more resonant." Or for that matter, "lighter wood is more resonant." "Guitars from ___ decade sound better." "Fingerboard wood makes a crucial difference." "One-piece bodies give better tone than mulit-piece."

Etc etc etc.

Yes, you should start that thread - won't be the first but they are usually quite popular. First someone will joke that spagetti decals sound better than modern ones. Someone else will quip that the number of plys the pickguard is made from vitally affects tone.

And soon someone will contradict a myth that someone else actually holds very dear (string gauge, say) and then a horrible row will break out and eventually Brad will have to lock the thead.

It's all good Saturday night entertainment... :D

'Night all - C

PS - I can feel them about to pour in even as I write. Would people mind putting their favorite myths on another thread, please? This one really is long enough already... :lol: :lol: :lol:


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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 5:31 pm
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Twelvebar wrote:
Except...

He had to settle with ernie ball because he was faking some Petrucci signature guitars:
http://www.ernieball.com/forums/music-m ... ement.html

Oh that is too tasty!

Twelvebar, as always you have your finger on the pulse. Thanks for posting!

Cheers man - C


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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 5:50 pm
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Ceri wrote:
Incidentally, you may be able to see a dark smudge just to the right of the output jack cavity in that last picture. A disadvantage of working outdoors is little contributions like that from birds flying overhead.

You know, in some cultures that is considered a very lucky omen. Your guitar has been anointed for an auspicious rebirth! 8)

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 7:13 pm
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russianracehorse wrote:
Ceri wrote:
Incidentally, you may be able to see a dark smudge just to the right of the output jack cavity in that last picture. A disadvantage of working outdoors is little contributions like that from birds flying overhead.

You know, in some cultures that is considered a very lucky omen. Your guitar has been anointed for an auspicious rebirth! 8)


Maybe it was Phoenix droppings considering this Strat's fiery rebirth.

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Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 11:58 pm
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Hi Ceri,
I've been checking every day for an update. It's good to see some progress! I was really wondering how you would pull this off, but I did'nt expect you were this good. Really, really impressive! 8)


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Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 11:21 am
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Thanks Trauma, thewood1987, Tanner1994 - and everyone. And to russianracehorse - but nobody ever tells you it's unlucky when that doesn't happen, do they? Not aware of any cultures around the world where they go about feeling depressed cos they didn't get peed on by a bird... :lol:

Gonna be lots of small daily steps from this point in. Here's the back of the bod, which also received two thin coats of vinyl sealer, giving it a slight sheen:
Image

Though the surface is now as smooth as I can get it there are plenty of unavoidable visual imperfections. Here's some of my very hard Milliput putty filling dents:
Image

Here's where I sculpted the heel. Feels nice - but the grain filler looks like an accident with melted chocolate, and the remains of that MIM veneer ain't helping visually either:
Image

You might recall from early on that these burns are not from Nick's pyrotechnics but were under the earlier sealer and so are from a previous heat gun paint stripping:
Image

And of course there's a touch of blackening remaining in the control cavity as well as two different types of putty rebuild. All nicely sealed in, but unappealing to the eye:
Image

In short, it is perfectly obvious that unlike the front we can't put a semi-transparent finish on the back and sides. We gotta cover that stuff up.

First thing is to mask the front. A card mask cut roughly to shape is taped on. Then I used the latex masking fluid to carefully extend that down to the edge of the faux binding strip:
Image

As previously mentioned, having demonstrated that I can do nitrocellulose on a previous project I am here using my preferred waterbase finish. Actually, the word "waterbase" can cover a multitude of different types of paint and varnish - anything where the carrier is water. For example, many car paints are waterbased these days, and on the other hand artist's gouache and watercolor paints are also waterbased - though they have nothing else in common with the former. For that matter, household emulsion paint is usually waterbased nowadays - and we sure don't want to put that on a guitar! So we need to be wary of words like "waterbased": they don't tell the whole story.

For this application I am using a furniture maker's acrylic sanding sealer and matching acrylic top lacquer. I'm told this brand is not available in North America, but there will be equivalents to purchase everywhere:
Image

We need to obliterate all those marks on the body permanently, so the first step is to put on an opaque layer of white sanding sealer. In the little jar I have mixed some sanding sealer with a strong white Liberon waterbased dye - one of the many attractions of waterbased products is being able to mix and match them with comparative freedom (though it is always important to check compatibility with manufacturers, which I have done here).

A waterbased process works a little differently than nitro in that around 65-70 percent of the finish is constructed from the sanding sealer - or "build coat" as people refer to it. So called because you build a layer of the sealer and then sand it back as flat as you possibly can, the top lacquer forming just a thin layer above with which to produce the mirror finish.

Actually, sanding sealer and top lacquer are essentially the same thing, but the sanding sealer has a higher solid content for faster build.

Here is the side of the body after a first coat. No matter how hard you try at the prepping stage there are always bad spots you miss, and I have a humdinger here. Dunno how this got through QC:
Image

We could spray endless layers, waiting for each to dry and sanding back before the next one until that mark has filled up with material and disappeared. Or we can just take a little brush and carefully paint some build coat in there, maybe in several stages, to fill that gap more quickly:
Image

I hope I've done that adequately. Now we have to leave it to harden overnight, sand it smooth tomorrow and spray more white over the top to see if we've got rid of the dent.

Little steps...

Cheers - C


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