marksound Posted April 29, 2005 Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 While looking at Melvyn Hiscock's website just now I came across something in the Gallery I'd never heard of on a guitar ... "This is called aqua regia, where you dampen curly maple with dilute (5%) nitric acid and then heat it with a hair dryer. The acid oxidizes the sugars in the wood, giving it the colour and accentuating the grain. Better living through chemistry!" Here is the page it's on. Look for the lefty amber flamed LP. Anyone ever done one of these? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrummerDude Posted April 29, 2005 Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 This method sounds interesting. Though, I'd put the guitar body in the cooking oven instead of using a hair dryer (low temperature, of course - I don't want guitar cookies ) This would save time and effort plus the heat would hit more evenly the guitar body. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erikbojerik Posted April 29, 2005 Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 Real aqua regia is a mixture of 75% concentrated hydrochloric acid (HCl) and 25% concentrated nitric acid (HNO3); when mixed it gets super hot, bubbles like hell, and oxidizes anything in its path. It is used to dissolve metals that won't dissolve any other way (like platinum and iridium). The fumes will kill you. Nitric acid is nasty stuff, even the 5% stuff will eat your skin...looks to me like you could do just as well with yellow & brown aniline dyes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drak Posted April 29, 2005 Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 I agree, that finish is nothing you couldn't get by far more normal means. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel Sorbera Posted April 29, 2005 Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 even the 5% stuff will eat your skin And you make that sound like a bad thing! I agree that it would be better to do it with dyes insted of acid Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marksound Posted April 29, 2005 Author Report Share Posted April 29, 2005 Yeah, that's what I thought too. It just struck me that if it was such a great idea, why weren't more people doing it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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