ADFinlayson Posted January 23 Report Share Posted January 23 I've been looking around in the usual places on the internet over the last 6 months or so for a beaten up PRS that I could get for a refin project. Having struggled to find anything that a). was a price I was willing to pay for a knocked around guitar. b) seller was prepared to ship or was very local, I had pretty much given up but having just stripped and refinished one of my builds I had a renewed interest. So a few days ago something did come up. It's a 2005 custom 22 Artist Pack, Royal blue with the wraparound finish (no faux binding) rosewood/abalone inlays. It doesn't look too bad on the face of it but all the finish has been remove from the neck, including serial number and there are lots of nasty chips along the edge. We can see the finish was clearly stripped with a heat gun which has caused some slightly bubbling either side of the neck pocket along with a visible seam where the top meets the body and lots of discolouration of the poly. There's a lot of fret sprout too which I'm assuming is down to heating the neck up, fortunately the frets are fairly level and not particularly warn and the neck appears to still be good and straight. The royal blue dye has gone entirely and only a turquoise shader remains I'm trying to decide what colour to make it, I don't really want to do blue again, while I like blue, it's not my favourite colour and it is the worst for fading, I'm also fairly limited on colours that go well with gold hardware. I am tempted by red or some kind of amber/tobacco. I am thinking of using proper nitro rather than pre-cat and doing a checked finish, although not on spec with PRS, I think that would be sympathetic to the ageing of the hardware. I think given the state of the area around the neck pocket, this will be a neck off job to strip it properly so I'll start there. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RVA Posted January 23 Report Share Posted January 23 Very interested to see this. When my PRS "V12" finish started to flake off like a sunburn, they refinished it for free without affecting the "fade" stain. Quite impressive to me. before after 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asdrael Posted January 23 Report Share Posted January 23 You know what goes well with gold hardware? Purple. I think you know how to do great purple finishes too (Also I have just found your Youtube channel, great stuff!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 23 Author Report Share Posted January 23 3 hours ago, RVA said: Very interested to see this. When my PRS "V12" finish started to flake off like a sunburn, they refinished it for free without affecting the "fade" stain. Quite impressive to me. before after That's a cool looking stain job, I think mine will be a little bit more conservative though. I think those sea shore style fades work a lot better with quilt than with flame. Ah I've done 3 guitars in purple over the last 10 months so I don't really want to do another one, also purple fades like blue does. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 24 Author Report Share Posted January 24 This all escalated much quicker than I expected I scored all around where the neck joins the body, inwards at a 45º angle to cut through the poly. although the finish had been sanded off the neck, it was still thick right at the join. Then I did about 15 minutes of iron. And pop, came out dead easy. Almost too easy... 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RVA Posted January 24 Report Share Posted January 24 3 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: This all escalated much quicker than I expected I scored all around where the neck joins the body, inwards at a 45º angle to cut through the poly. although the finish had been sanded off the neck, it was still thick right at the join. Then I did about 15 minutes of iron. And pop, came out dead easy. Almost too easy... Wow, very nice. Did you do that with just heat through a paper towel from the back only? Was the paper towel wet? Did it affect the finish (which I know would not concern you do to the pending refinish, but in case it was relevant). Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henrim Posted January 24 Report Share Posted January 24 9 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: And pop, came out dead easy. Almost too easy... Wow! That came out nice and easy. 19 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: I'm also fairly limited on colours that go well with gold hardware. Very much a subjective thing. Personally I'm not into gold hardware. Only guitar I have ever had with gold hardware was an alpine white Les Paul Custom. Although I'd probably never do that myself, that combination kinda works for me. But that is pointless because solid colour is of course out of question in your case. If I recall it correct, you made a beautiful graphite grey finish on one guitar with figured top? That could work. Or that tobacco burst you mentioned. Done right, it would tame down the gold and blend the hardware to the body and make it all more subtle. I'm confident you could make that work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 24 Author Report Share Posted January 24 After a successful neck removal yesterday, I made a start on sanding this evening. I used the bobbin sander with 80 grit to get a lot off the sides, especially the concave regions but I took the worst off the convex areas with that sander too. The bobbin sander tends to skip over convex curves and leave loads of tiny ridges, that's why I didn't finish the job with the bobbin sander. I then used the random orbital sander to tidy everything up at 120g. Then I got on to sanding the back. 80 grit abrenet pad, this took a long time - the finish on the back was seriously thick. If I took an 80 grit random orbital on full speed to one if my builds, I would be through the lacquer in seconds. After at least 20 mins sanding the back, this is where it's at now With a bit more sanding I think I should be able to get the faux binding to come up pretty nice, I think I will move up a grit to finish off though. I am conscious about altering the shape with all this sanding. I am getting the back and sides perfect before I touch the top because there is a lot of moving it around while sanding and I want to protect the top as well as I can. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RVA Posted January 24 Report Share Posted January 24 There was a very nice back hiding under there! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 24 Author Report Share Posted January 24 6 minutes ago, RVA said: There was a very nice back hiding under there! yes, it's all lovely wood, nice and light too. Clearly 2005 was a year when it was still easy to find light-weight mahogany. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 25 Report Share Posted January 25 8 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: 80 grit abrenet pad, this took a long time - the finish on the back was seriously thick. Back in the day when we bought this house we wanted to get rid of the old paint on the floor and hired a pro to do it with a big belt sander, the base was a square foot or so. And the belts: Starting at 16 grit he used several sequences before getting to 100 g for bare wood. The actual thickness of the old paint may have been somewhere around one mm or even less but the old skool floor paint was made to last. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 27 Author Report Share Posted January 27 On 1/25/2024 at 7:12 AM, Bizman62 said: Back in the day when we bought this house we wanted to get rid of the old paint on the floor and hired a pro to do it with a big belt sander, the base was a square foot or so. And the belts: Starting at 16 grit he used several sequences before getting to 100 g for bare wood. The actual thickness of the old paint may have been somewhere around one mm or even less but the old skool floor paint was made to last. Are you saying I should hire a pro with a belt sander? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 27 Author Report Share Posted January 27 I am just getting to that point where I have had just about enough of sanding. It doesn't look too bad like this But when I wiped it down with spirits I could see quite a lot of dye still in the wood It's weird, there is the clearcoat and the colour which I was able to sand through quite quickly, but then the lighter blue/greeny looking stuff (on the outside of the horn) is some kind of base coat over top of the dyed wood that has taken on colour from either the dye or the colour coat above but it is absolutely a separate layer and considerably harder to sand through than the paint above. Something else I found interesting, the Mirka abranet pads are barely touching it, I switched the sander over to the 5" pad so I could use my 5" xtract discs and they were considerably more affective at removing paint. It's getting close, probably another hour of sanding the top before I can move on to finer grits. Apart from the upper horn, everywhere else is getting raised grain with water so I think it's at a point where it will take stain again. The bowl sander made mincemeat of the pot recesses too, I used an 80 grit bobbin follow by a 120 and got through the paint in no time. That tool was such a good purchase. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 27 Report Share Posted January 27 3 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: Are you saying I should hire a pro with a belt sander? I consider you pro enough, just pointing out that there's really rough grits for really tough finishes. And I guess after all these years you knew what I meant. Or, as @mistermikev put it shortly after I followed you to this forum, "I thought he was your friend!" 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 27 Report Share Posted January 27 3 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: Something else I found interesting, the Mirka abranet pads are barely touching it, I switched the sander over to the 5" pad so I could use my 5" xtract discs and they were considerably more effective at removing paint. I've noticed something similar with Abranet. It works fine for some surfaces but not so well on others. My local car paint dealer once gave me a sample pack of 3M™ Cubitron™ II Hookit™ pads which are intended for sanding finishes smoothly but effectively. They also seem to work well on wood. Abranet still has its use but it depends on the task at hand, often requiring testing which one works best. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 27 Author Report Share Posted January 27 2 hours ago, Bizman62 said: I consider you pro enough, just pointing out that there's really rough grits for really tough finishes. And I guess after all these years you knew what I meant. Or, as @mistermikev put it shortly after I followed you to this forum, "I thought he was your friend!" that's alright I was just jesting, I would gladly have taken it to someone who is better at sanding than me! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 27 Author Report Share Posted January 27 2 hours ago, Bizman62 said: I've noticed something similar with Abranet. It works fine for some surfaces but not so well on others. My local car paint dealer once gave me a sample pack of 3M™ Cubitron™ II Hookit™ pads which are intended for sanding finishes smoothly but effectively. They also seem to work well on wood. Abranet still has its use but it depends on the task at hand, often requiring testing which one works best. I think Abranet is good at sanding wood, raelly good actually, it seems to skip over poly though 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 27 Report Share Posted January 27 5 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: I think Abranet is good at sanding wood, raelly good actually, it seems to skip over poly though Exactly. My observations tell a similar story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 27 Author Report Share Posted January 27 I was doing some rough level sanding of cellulose with P600 abranet this afternoon and it seems to work really well for dry sanding lacquer. I have also been using the p1000 pads to scuff up lacquer if I haven't sprayed anything for a few days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 27 Report Share Posted January 27 There's finishes and there's finishes. Cellulose can be much softer than 2k poly. No wonder I got the 3M pads from a car paint shop! Last summer I bought and sort of restored some older hand planes which led me to search for some information about the black finish on old Stanley planes. No wonder that the finish on them (and old Singer sewing machines and T-Fords) has been able to last a century: It's not paint! Instead it's a mixture of BLO and asphalt melted on the surface. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 29 Author Report Share Posted January 29 Well. getting all this dye out is proving to be a real pain in the butt. It's pretty much only in the end grain now, I don't know whether to keep sanding (this is 80 grit with the random orbital) and risk altering the shape slightly, or just live with it. I have given this a quick wipe down with white spirits so I think this is probably the most obvious it is going to be. I kind of think that the combination of dyed top and a dark shader over the mahogany will probably make it not obvious, but at the same time you know when you've seen something you can never unsee it. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 29 Report Share Posted January 29 5 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: Well. getting all this dye out is proving to be a real pain in the butt. It's pretty much only in the end grain now, Are you 100% positive that it's dye? To me it looks similar to the discoloration caused by fungus seen in many pale woods. The vertical lines on the top seem to have similar bluish greyness in a number of shades. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henrim Posted January 29 Report Share Posted January 29 9 minutes ago, Bizman62 said: To me it looks similar to the discoloration caused by fungus seen in many pale woods. What ever it is, I'd be surprised if the dye wasn't so deep in the endgrain that you have to sand off more than just the surface. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ADFinlayson Posted January 29 Author Report Share Posted January 29 3 hours ago, Bizman62 said: Are you 100% positive that it's dye? To me it looks similar to the discoloration caused by fungus seen in many pale woods. The vertical lines on the top seem to have similar bluish greyness in a number of shades. While that is possible, I think it's unlikely. The greyish look in the top is because there is still a small amount of blue in there too, I am planning on doing a black/sandback on this guitar so I haven't gone as far as sanding every spec of dye out of the top - The blue dye is very heavily faded so it looks grey, the blue colour we saw at the beginning of this little expedition has come almost entirely from the paint...I think. This top reminds me of some of the maple tops I've worked on originating in Eastern Europe. It was obviously a big and old tree from how close together the grain lines are together and it has a those fine brown mineral runs that follow the grain lines along withthe ever so slightly wavy grain direction. I think I've got a couple of Croatian tops in the pile so I will compare. Although it's all just for fun because I have no way of actually knowing the origin of the top on this guitar. 2 hours ago, henrim said: What ever it is, I'd be surprised if the dye wasn't so deep in the endgrain that you have to sand off more than just the surface. Completely agree, maple endgrain is extremely thirsty and I don't think I'm ever going to get it out completely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted January 29 Report Share Posted January 29 4 hours ago, ADFinlayson said: While that is possible, I think it's unlikely. The greyish look in the top is because there is still a small amount of blue in there too, Can't you accept a rescue route when it's offered to you on a golden plate? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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