Dealing with thin veneers...

[IanKJ]

Hey, guys. I've recently begun a Les Paul project, and have picked myself up a quilted maple Chinese body n' neck. The details on the page say that the maple veneer is .6mm thick, and I'm looking for any and all advice in dealing with it. 
My plan is to do an amber finish, no burst. Since I know that it's advisable not to wet a thin veneer too much because of delamination, I wanted to know if anyone has any information about how to deal with a thin veneer.

My specific questions are:
1) If I wanted to do a "figure pop", is .6mm going to give me enough room to do a sand-back?
2) If I wanted to keep from getting too much water on the veneer, should I maybe perform the figure pop with a non-water-based stain, do a sand-back, and THEN stain my main color with a water-based stain? Or should I honestly stay away from water altogether?

Thanks for any help, and again, I am looking for any and all help with veneers and just staining in general. Thanks again.

[IanKJ]

Also, I see the decimal is kinda small, so please note that it is "POINT 6 MM." as in "Not a full millimeter." 

[Bizman62]

Hi and welcome to the addiction!

I've been using 0.55 mm veneer for several purposes in my guitars and I can tell that it's thicker than you'd think! But - you guessed there'd be a "but"! - how much have the Chinese sanded the veneer to get rid of potential humps and lumps? Anyhow, there should be plenty enough for sanding back with a fine enough paper.

To answer your questions:

1. If the Chinese have done the veneering well enough you should have enough room
2. No matter what the solvent in your stain is, don't flood the top! Use a folded shop towel or rag relatively dry to apply the stain rather than a wide brush dipped into a bucket of stain. If don't want your sanded-back stain to blend with the main colour, using alcohol based for the base and water based for the main can help.

If you're just going to make the quilt look deeper, I'd suggest some sort of brown instead of black. Using a "woody" colour will look more natural and less dirty. Darker shades of what you see on the wood are usually a safe bet. For other effects you can also use strange sounding combinations, like pink for the bottom and green or blue for the main. Try to find some quilted maple scraps for testing, don't experiment with something you don't know about on the actual guitar!

When sanding, use premium quality sandpapers! The result will be smoother with less removal of the material. Also, don't ever lay weight on the sandpaper! You can't press it deeper than the height of the grain which is only a fraction of a mm but if you try to, you'll end up having burnished lumps of sawdust digging grooves into the veneer deeper than you can sand away!

 

[Andyjr1515]

Pretty much what @Bizman62 says above ^

 

[killemall8]

Ive used veneer many times, 1/42" thick.
Advice i can give, do NOT use water based dyes or stain. It will delaminate.
One sand back is about max, stay away from corners and points most of all.

 

[IanKJ]

Cool. Cool. That was very nice, succinct info. I was thinking the same thing with going in with a brown first instead of a black for the grain pop, and does anyone have a suggestion for best non-water-based dyes? 

Also! Does anyone have a trick for finding glue spots before staining? I've seen enough of these Chinese kits get put together to know you're 95% likely to have glue spots you should have dealt with before you started staining. Is there a trick for finding'em before they find you?

[Bizman62]

4 hours ago, IanKJ said:

Also! Does anyone have a trick for finding glue spots before staining?

You can wipe the surface with a rag dampened with water or mineral spirits. I guess other fast evaporating liquids like alcohol, acetone, lighter fluid or thinner should work as well. Anyhow, the idea is to temporarily show how it would look like with a clearcoat. Just don't overdo with the moistening to prevent delaminating.

Notice that when you dampen wood it will raise the fibres so a very light sanding may be preferable to cut just the stubble before applying stain for a smoother, more even result.

[Andyjr1515]

5 hours ago, IanKJ said:

Does anyone have a trick for finding glue spots before staining?

Just get a clean rag, wet it, squeeze it out and give the veneer a quick wipe over.  The veneer will darken but the glue spots will show up as lighter blobs.  Dampening like this will not delaminate the veneer.  If you are particularly concerned about delamination, then you can do the same thing with methelated spirits.

Personally, I generally use water based stains (I normally use pen inks).  The main thing, as @Bizman62 says, is to not soak the veneer - and I would say exactly the same when using spirit stains as, if the veneer is soaked, it can still expand and buckle if there are any areas where the underlying glue coverage is poor.

 

[Andyjr1515]

Haha!  @Bizman62 and I were obviously typing at the same time!

Happily, I think we are both saying the same thing 

[Bizman62]

3 hours ago, Andyjr1515 said:

Happily, I think we are both saying the same thing 

It's always a relief that someone confirms any advice. It often happens that the brain turns an idea upside down. or the question is misread, or the answerer simply doesn't know what they's talking about.

[Andyjr1515]

2 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

or the answerer simply doesn't know what they's talking about

...and that's usually me! 

[IanKJ]

Also cool. From everything I've gathered, I think I'm definitely going to go out of my way to avoid water at any cost, except maaaaaybe for the colored finish. I would like to avoid water even then, but I hear it's easiest to avoid blotchiness when using water, so I'll probably do that. I think I'll try to get a couple quilted maple scraps off eBay and see what's up beforehand. Other than that, I think I'm good to go on the veneer questions, so thanks to everyone for the help, and I'll be asking some other questions as I need them answers. Thanks again! 

Oh yeah, what's everyone's preferred way to get rid of glue spots? I've seen the heat/moisture method and the sanding method, does anyone have a preference?

[Andyjr1515]

7 minutes ago, IanKJ said:

Oh yeah, what's everyone's preferred way to get rid of glue spots? I've seen the heat/moisture method and the sanding method, does anyone have a preference?

Sanding.  Any other method is likely to leave a residue that will show in the stained surface.

[Bizman62]

I must agree with @Andyjr1515. Moistening can show where the glue spots are but the only way to get rid of them is sanding/scraping, with hopes that the glue hasn't seeped through the veneer.

[IanKJ]

I've been doing some reading, and I'm kiiiinda running into a bit of confusion regarding mineral spirits and methylated spirits. One thing I know for sure by now is that mineral spirits apparently DO NOT raise grain, and are thus good for grain highlighting, but I did see something about how methylated spirits DO raise grain a touch, but when I tried to look into this more, I couldn't find anything. Google keeps giving me results for mineral spirits when I try to Google methylated spirits, so it's hard.

What's everyone's knowledge about mineral vs. methylated spirits in both grain raising and grain highlighting? And, actually, what's everyone's knowledge about the two in general when it comes to guitar shit?

[Bizman62]

Mineral spirits leave some oily residue so I'd be careful with that before staining especially with a water based stain. Alcohol might be a safer option.

That said, this article mentions both for cleaning wood before staining: https://woodworkingclarity.com/clean-wood-after-sanding-before-staining/

[Andyjr1515]

It also depends where in the world you are - the products are called different things.  I might be wrong, but I think what we call 'White spirit' in the UK is what they call mineral spirits in US.  In my view, that is not suitable as it has additives that will remain on the wood. 

Methylated spirits in UK is a pretty much pure alcohol - it generally is sold with a very light dye to stop folks drinking it (it kills you).  I think ethanol can be purchased in US ?  That is also a pure alcohol.  These pure alcohols are fine on unfinished woods as they quickly evaporate leaving no residue.

(Which is pretty much what @Bizman62 also said...again )