Anyone Ever Spray Or See A Really Good Transparent White Finish?

[thegarehanman]

I'm debating on what sort of finish I want to spray on an upcoming build with a AAA flamed maple top. I'm leaning towards a transparent white finish, but I'm not sure that's the way I want to go. The deciding factor will be how transparent a finish I can get while still maintaining the white overtones. I plan to do some test pieces, but I'd love to see some examples if anyone's perfected a technique or formula for this already.

peace,

russ

[marksound]

Russ, try Reranch Mary Kaye White. (It's not on the order page, but just pick any color and enter Mary Kaye White in the comment box.) As always, if the store is closed keep checking back.

[Maiden69]

Drak once mentioned using a bit of white paint and adding it to the clear. I know that Createx Auto Air have a translucent white. That one you can coat with either nitro or poly. But Ithink that the diluted paint will be a better option.

[thegarehanman]

Thanks marksound; I prefer to stick with my polyester finishes though, so I'm going to see what I can do with that for now. The current plan is to just add a few drops of white to a batch of clear, like maiden suggests. I remember hearing that it helps to add a tad bit of blue to the white to avoid having the finish look flesh colored. I was mostly just curious if anyone had really good pictures, to see if what I'm aiming for is feasible or unrealistic.

Edited August 22, 2007 by thegarehanman

[hooglebug]

hmmm i was thinking about doing a mary kaye type thing somewhere down the line. if you go through with it post pics so we can see how it goes. and if you dont, i guess i'll just have to try it for myself. gulp

[Drak]

Yes. Obviously, white is a pigment, not a transparent dye, so to make transparent white, you need to add some white to your clear, just a little bit.

One should experiment on some scrap with amounts before shooting the guitar to see how much white you want. You don't want to add too much so it goes on almost opaque from the first coat, and you don't want to add so little that it takes numerous coats to get where you want, but it doesn't take much at all really, just a very small bit of white pigment added to your clear.

I would steer away from adding blue unless that's what you want, white is pure white, not 'flesh' colored. Don't know who said that, but it sounds a bit ridiculous to me, like the person really didn't know what they were talking about.

I remember seeing some Fender Telecasters in the '80's that were production transparent white, you could easily see the grain underneath the white, and the white was white, very good looking guitars they were. I've done trans white before, but no pics to show unfortunately.

[thegarehanman]

Drak, the concern with the "flesh" tone after spraying the white didn't stem from the white not being, in fact, white. It was more based on the fact that you're spraying white over wood, which often can be sort of salmon colored, and could tinge the white, since it's not opaque. This shouldn't be too much of a problem as the maple top I'm using is pretty much as light as maple comes. Thanks for the $.02 tip though.

[verhoevenc]

I'm not 100% sure... but I think one of the stew-mac spraying videos I have he does a trans white... I'll look through tonight when I have some time to sit down and watch the videos.

Chris

[ryanb]

I'm not 100% sure... but I think one of the stew-mac spraying videos I have he does a trans white... I'll look through tonight when I have some time to sit down and watch the videos.

Chris

Yes. Dan Erlewine does a Mary-Kay white finish in the spray-finishing video SM currently sells.

[Mr. Preston Swift]

sorry for the late add, but i know Schecter makes a transparent white bass that looks really nice.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Sch...Bass?sku=513050

would it be possible to do a sand back black and white finish on the maple? (like PRS sand back kind)

[low end fuzz]

i think thats just a satin clear coat; could be wrong

[Racer X]

the Fender Mary Kaye Strat was the first thing I thought of. Beautiful guitar. Actually made me think about doing one of mine in that finish. Glad to hear Re-ranch has that, available.