Project: Refinishing A "refinished" Guitar

[JackyB]

Subject: Fender Newporter acoustic guitar

Project 1 (failed) Take a quick glance at my original thread: (Link). Cliffs notes: I bought a cheap guitar and attempted to make it better. It was a complete and utter failure. All I succeded in was making a mess even messier. Considered giving it up, but I decided the other day I wanted to do it right.

None of the pictures in that thread work anymore, but I took some new starting pictures, so you'll have a good idea of how bad it really was. All images are thumbnails, click on them for a larger view.

Day 1

Here's an overview of the front of the guitar. Nothing looks too bad from here. I appologize for the poor lighting, this was in my basement shop.

Overview of the back. You can start to see just how awful the finish is

Another shot of my shitty brushing job with the poly. You can also see how I didn't evenly sand the whole thing. Some of it is sanded to the bare wood, most of it has the factory stain, and there are a few parts where you can see I started to put on a darker stain, but I changed my mind before it dried.

Another shot of the back finish. I used a paintbrush for this.

Here's the plate that the neck screws into. I obviously didn't remove the badge when I refinished. It's coated with poly.

A better shot of the crack on the top that runs down from the head of the top to the bridge. I'll have to sand it down and fill it.

Closeup of the bridge. You can start to see the uneven finish and piss-poor job. Also note the large crack on towards the head of the guitar.

Here's the neck. There's lots of poly run-off from the back that dripped towards the fretboard. It shows some of the poly that dripped onto the neck. Wrecklessness. Also notice how I attempted to sand off the poly

Here's a great pic of the headstock and how ****ed up the finish is. There's bubbles and **** in it and everything.

The edge where the bottom and sides meet. Lots of damage. Most of this is repairable I think.

Edited April 27, 2005 by JackyB

[JackyB]

Day 2

Here it is almost completely disassembled with all my tools I used. The plate on the back was plastered to the wood so I had to use a 1/2" chisel and hammer to pry it off. Minimal damage to the wood. Everything else was pretty easy. I still don't know how to get the bridge off. There seems to be 2 pins holding it in (see above pics) as well as being glued down. If you know how to get this off please help me.

Getting ready to start sanding. I started with 60 grit sandpaper with an automatic sander (not belt sander.) It's too cold and rainy to go outside and use a chemical stipper. Plus this is a lot easier and cleaner, just a little more time consuming. Another plus side of this method is it takes the stain out as well.

I wish I took some "in-progress" pics, but here's the end results of sanding the back. Looks SO much nicer. My initial plan was to stain it again, but I think I might just clear coat it. The mahogany is so beautiful.

Another angle. You can see the light reflection. Note there are still a couple dark spots where the stain still remains. I'll go back and go over the whole back with a finer grit sandpaper and hit some of the dirty spots. It's a bit too late to be running the sander. Don't want to piss my neighbors off.

Yet another angle. The bare wood is like night/day compared the the shitty, damaged poly finish. Why I went and screwed this guitar up as much as I did is beyond even me. Absolutely beautiful wood.

I'm still not sure if this was a good idea, but there was a good amount poly that dripped onto the fretboard. I decided I wanted to sand down all the finish on the fretboard and I'll go back and re-finish it. I only got to about the 12th fret tonight before my hands got too tired (I hand-sanded all of this. No sanding block or anything, just sand paper and my hands. I went back after this picture was tooken and cleaned up quite a bit around the frets. This is all extremely time consuming. I'm not sure if I'll be able to sand all the poly down while keeping the stock Fender Newporter logo. I don't know where/how I can order any of these, if you know of a place I can buy them, please tell me.

Edited April 27, 2005 by JackyB

[JackyB]

Day 3 (to be continued later this evening...)

Decided to get started on finishing the sanding job. Got staretd on the front.

Getting there. Decided there's no point in preserving the decorative stick that goes around the sound hole.

Got most of it. From the start of this project until now I've gone through an entire packet of 60 grit sandpaper (5 whole sheets.)

Got as much done as I can with the bridge still on. The more I think about it, the more I think I should just leave the bridge on. That crack on the face really worries me since it stops at the bridge. I sanded the bridge down the best I could by hand, and worked around it with a small square of sand paper. I'll probably just mask the bridge when I have to start putting a finish on the body.

I finished the front early, so I decided to get a start on the sides. I thought this would be the most time consuming part of the sanding job...

But it moved along surprisingly fast.

Here's the finished product.

Later tonight I'll go back and start sanding with finer sand paper and maybe start working on the neck some more. I'm still undecided about how to finish it. I don't know if I want to stain it or just leave it natural and clear coat it.

[RGGR]

Isn't life not a wonderfull process of screw-up and recoverings.

I think with right finish this guitar will look super. May try Stewmac or Lmii for proper roset? (hole decoration, I mean).

[JackyB]

Isn't life not a wonderfull process of screw-up and recoverings.

I think with right finish this guitar will look super. May try Stewmac or Lmii for proper roset? (hole decoration, I mean).

←

Yeah, I'll look into it. I'll measure the diameter of the hole when I get home. I think it will look a bit plain without one. How do they usually go on? After staining but before clear coat?

Thanks for the encouragement . I'm really determined to do this right. I'll get some grain filler because the mahogany is very porous. I'm going to get this sucker to be as flat and reflective as a mirror, no matter how many wet sandings it takes.

[RAI6]

After seeing that guitar sanded down to bare wood, I think it would look absolutely stunning in a satin clear...

It would actually look quite "classy".

"Shiny" isn't always a good thing...

But that's just my opinion.

[JackyB]

After seeing that guitar sanded down to bare wood, I think it would look absolutely stunning in a satin clear...

It would actually look quite "classy".

"Shiny" isn't always a good thing...

But that's just my opinion.

←

I got a couple supplies today:

I didn't have a scrap piece of mahogany laying around, so I tested the little bit where the pick guard will be in case something went wrong. The more I look at that test area, the more I think you're right about the satin finish. I'm not sure if I got the right thing. I'm guessing there's a difference between wood filler and grain filler.

I was really hoping for that glassy, smooth finished look, but the grain is still very visible. Will more sanding and coats help cure that, or will I need to fix something with my grain-filling technique? I just applied the wood filler and pasted it on with a putty knife with plenty of pressure. I gave it a little more than an hour to dry, then sanded it down. Any input? I'm kind of stuck here, I don't want to move on until I can get the finish right.

Edited April 28, 2005 by JackyB

[Shamrock]

After seeing that guitar sanded down to bare wood, I think it would look absolutely stunning in a satin clear...

It would actually look quite "classy".

"Shiny" isn't always a good thing...

But that's just my opinion.

←

I finish almost all of my customs in Satin...unless a customer insists on a gloss finish. The satin doesn't reflect spotlights and blind the audience from the stage.

[marksound]

I'm guessing there's a difference between wood filler and grain filler.

Wood filler and grain filler are not the same thing.

Google "grain filler" and you'll find more resources than you can shake a stick at.

Wood filler shouldn't even be in the same room as a guitar. IMHO, of course.

[Doc]

I hope this helps:

1) do a search on refinishing on this site.

2) If that's a water based wood filler throw it away. It'll just make a mess.

3) Why are you using polyurethane? Go back to Lowe's or Home Depot and get a couple of cans of Deft. Gloss or satin.Do a search on this site for "Deft". It's a much better instrument finish. Looks better, sounds better too. The other frequent posts will tell you why you don't really want to use floor finish for your guitar. Deft is actually easier to get a professional looking result form than any poly I've ever seen.

[Setch]

Here's a couple of pointers to prevent this being refinish 2 of 3.

1. You have a lot more surface prep to do before *any* finishing product comes into play.

60 grit is far to course for anything other than gross stock removal, since it leaves deep scratches in the grain, especially when used on a power sander. It may remove material quickly, but now you'll have a ton of sanding to remove the scratches the 60 grit has left. Before you worry about grainfilling or anything like that, sand with 100, 120 & 240 until *all* scratches are removed. Wipe down with mineral spirits to see how you're doing - otherwise you'll be in for a horrible surprise when you apply your finish. Crossgrain scratches create small areas of endgrain, which soak up more finish, and look like crap.

2. Stop sanding the neck across the grain! You'll *never* remove those scratches, and you've actually unlevelled the surface of the fretboard, not to mention scratching the frets.

Never *never* sand wood across the grain if it's avoidable. A razor blade as a scraper could remove the poly on the fretboard, but I really don't know what you can do to the areas you've sanded, short of pulling the frets and relevelling the neck, then refretting.

[JackyB]

Okay, I finished most of the prep work on the body. I worked my way down to 240 grit sand paper. Then I moistened the wood to raise the grain, then I sanded it again. The bare wood is soooo smooth right now I'd almost be tempted to leave it unfinished . I filled the large crack above the bridge with wood filler and sanded it down. It's completely flush now, although it looks a little strange because of the way the wood is cracked. I think the poly should cover it up just fine.

I couldn't find any grain filler at neither Lowe's nor Home Depot. I think what I'll try doing is wiping on a thin layer of poly (I bought a new can of Deft Satin clear coat) with a rag, letting it dry, then sanding it down with 240 grit. I think that should fill the grain just fine. Any comments on this? I'm going to do a little more sanding tomorrow before I wipe on the first coat of poly.

I didn't do much today or yesterday. I bevelled down the edge between the sides and the back to help clean up some of those nasty dings you can see here:

http://www.imagehigh.com/view.php?image_id=951

I also used a chemical stripper to clean up the back plate/badge that holds the neck screws in place and polished it up with a metal polishing compound. It shines like a mirror. And of course I did a lot of sanding, working up to 240 grit sand paper. The wood looked absolutely stunning while it was wet. Hopefully the clear coat will bring out some of that same beauty.