Heritage Red Or Dakota Red

[Xanthus]

Straight from a n00b's mouth

So I've decided on either Heritage or Dakota Red for half of my Explorer project. My plan is to paint the guitar body black (it's a neck-through) and the neck and bevels one of the two reds. Since I'm still unsure on whether I want the grain to show through on the bevels, I picked the SG-style Heritage Red as an alternative.

I'll have to use a primer under the black, and none on the bevels, if I want the grain to show through for the heritage red.

Has anyone used Heritage over a primer? What does it look like?

I'm also thinking of using dark grain filler on both the mahogany and the maple, to accent the grain, if I go with Heritage.

So it's either: Dakota/primer, Heritage/primer, or Heritage/no primer.

OR would it be better to get the Heritage wood dye and mix with reducer? I'm assuming that the resulting solution would be sprayed, as it says on the ReRanch site that it can't be applied directly to the wood. Heh, this is me knowing jack about painting.

In any case, I like the feel of a satin neck, not gloss. I know it's easy if the neck is a bolt on, but I was wondering if I'd be able to just tape off the neck, shoot the gloss over the body, then do satin over the neck. Is that a generally accepted practice?

-Xanthus