Changing colour of stain using transtint clear coat over the top

[dwrockdoctor]

Hi all!

New member here. I have a PRS CE24 guitar that has developed some clouding in the clear coat around the edges and I am looking to take back the clear coat enough to get rid of this. So far I have used judicious use of paint stripper in a section under where the trem sits to knock back some of the clear so I can try a few things without going full gung ho and regretting any decisions before going ahead with any final plans.

 

The guitar currently has a factory black cherry stain over a flame maple top. I was wondering if it's possible to use a transtint clear coat to change the colour shade to more of a tortoise shell brown? The idea is to use minwax wipe on poly with transtint added in, what kind of colour of transtint would I need to use to go from the current dark cherry in the picture below to something more like the attached picture of a guitar in tortoise shell brown?

This:

To this:

 

 

 

[ScottR]

An orange tint over the top of that would likely get close to the brown you are looking for,with perhaps a brown tint layer added as well. Your issue is going to be finding a poly that trans tint will mix with. If the poly is oil based you may have a problem as trans tint does not like oil. You want to find a solvent that will both thin the clear and dissolve the trans tint. It will dissolve in water, alcohol and lacquer thinner, that I know of, but not mineral spirits. You may want to consider lacquer instead of poly, And either way you will want some clear over the top of your tint to protect it. Otherwise any wear will rub away color as well as clear.

SR

[dwrockdoctor]

Thanks for the reply Scott.

Would an amber tinted nitro lacquer work? That's the easiest one I can find available in Australia when I check google. I thought green over red would make brown but maybe that's just when mixing colours and not tinting over the top, do tints work different when it comes to putting colour tints over existing stains?

As it stands, I think the small amount of clear I have removed underneath where the trem goes is just the top coat. Definitely not down to just the stained wood at this point as any small experiments with regular stain just wipe off immediately (as you would expect with if a poly coat or undercoat still remains as it appears it does). 

This era PRS used a polyester base coat with an acrylic urethane top coat, would a tinted nitro aerosol apply okay over either of these coats? (depending on which coat i've gone down to already in my little test area).

[ScottR]

layering transparent colors over each other yields pretty much the same color as mixing them together, with the added bonus of being able to use them to make cool bursts and color shifts.

I can't speak to the ability of a specific nitro to stick to a poly or urethane, except in general; my experience is nitro sticks to many plastics quite well. So odds are good, but testing is the only way to know for sure.

SR