Newbie Painting Questions

[Inisheer]

I am finally ready to do my first paint job (on a cheap saga kit for practice). But I have a few last minute questions before go at it.

1. May be a dumb question, but what do I lay the guitar on while I sand/polish? Do I lay it on a hard surface or a towel? Won't the paint take on the texture of what I lay it on?

2. I got my kit from Universal Jems and it comes with some black stuff in the pickup cavities (shielding paint or something I think.... ) It rubs off on my fingers when I touch it, so does that mean it may come off when I paint it? Should I mask off the cavities before I paint to prevent this?

Thanks in advance for any advice. I'll post some pics when I finish it, if anybody cares.

Edited May 31, 2006 by shredgtrfan

[al heeley]

Thread a bent coat hanger thru one of the holes in the neck joint and hang it from a beam or similar, then you don't have to lay it down anywhere while the paint cures.

Mask off the cavities before spraying if they have already got shielding paint in them.

[marksound]

Be careful around that body while it's hanging or it will throw itself violently to the floor bumping and banging anything and everything in its path and ruin your brand new finish. Trust me.

[Inisheer]

Hey, thanks for the tips. I figured I'd need to mask off the cavities, but I wanted to double check with the pros. And for hanging the guitar, I was going to do that when I painted and to let it cure. But I wanted to know where to lay the guitar for wetsanding and the final polish. Do you still let the guitar hang for this?

[al heeley]

No, once the paint or lacquer is hard enough, lay it on an old clean towel on your bench for the final rubbing/buffing. I tried refinishing one on my lap sitting on the leather sofa in the living room while watching a satriani video, and it didn't go down very well with the wife

[Racer X]

Word to the wise: If you THINK the laquer is hard enough, it still probably isn't. If it isn't, and you put it on that towel, and start applying pressure, to rub it out, you are gonna get towel impressions in the finish. Sometimes it can take up to a year before laquer is cured enough to even place in a case, without getting the impressions of the faux fur in it.

BE CAREFUL!!

[Dino]

Word to the wise: If you THINK the laquer is hard enough, it still probably isn't. If it isn't, and you put it on that towel, and start applying pressure, to rub it out, you are gonna get towel impressions in the finish. Sometimes it can take up to a year before laquer is cured enough to even place in a case, without getting the impressions of the faux fur in it.

BE CAREFUL!!

+1

I've got guitars that have been hanging for a year after spraying them with Krylon.

A couple of them have developed wrinkles and cracks just from chemical reactions caused by the paint curing.

Regardless of what you may have read in some ebook, spraypaint was made to be used on lawn furniture, not guitars.

Unfortunately, those paintjobs will have to be done over.

Fortunately, I now have a compressor and the sprayguns needed to paint them correctly.

Edited June 2, 2006 by Dino