Purple Dinkyish Build

[ScottR]

9 hours ago, Andyjr1515 said:

I would vouch ALL of us

Oh my lord yes!  Count me in that group.

It's pretty much an unwritten rule that one of the best measures of the quality of a luthier is how good he is at repairing all the stupid crap he allows to happen to his build.

SR

[sadclevelandsports]

Finishing stretch, didnt fix every single imperfection, but this was a proof of concept guitar for me anyway, so I'm reasonably satisfied. Used an old parts neck because I was too traumatized to make a new one at this juncture. Now I just gotta make all the electricals are in place..

Edited Monday at 01:11 AM by sadclevelandsports

[Bizman62]

To me that looks plenty good enough. But where did all the gloss go?

[sadclevelandsports]

5 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

To me that looks plenty good enough. But where did all the gloss go?

The plan in my mind was always to get to a satin, especially because I don't have any buffing equipment. I used.the angrove matte spray plus gunstock wax method.

[Bizman62]

Good work with the satin. No gloss whatsoever.

Regarding buffing equipment, all you need is a rag and some cutting compound(s) depending on how fine sand"paper" you've used. On my second 2k finish I used an orbital sander on the flat surfaces for leveling, then went through the grits wet up to 6000 (3M intended for finishing car paint). I must admit that the "swirl remover" wasn't the best option after that, it required quite a lot of elbow grease. That very compound was the finest of three and since wet 6000 already leaves just a faint milky surface I skimped and bought just one compound. But yes, a soft block with very fine sanding discs and a rag with cutting compound is all it really takes to buff a guitar.

[sadclevelandsports]

1 hour ago, Bizman62 said:

Good work with the satin. No gloss whatsoever.

Regarding buffing equipment, all you need is a rag and some cutting compound(s) depending on how fine sand"paper" you've used. On my second 2k finish I used an orbital sander on the flat surfaces for leveling, then went through the grits wet up to 6000 (3M intended for finishing car paint). I must admit that the "swirl remover" wasn't the best option after that, it required quite a lot of elbow grease. That very compound was the finest of three and since wet 6000 already leaves just a faint milky surface I skimped and bought just one compound. But yes, a soft block with very fine sanding discs and a rag with cutting compound is all it really takes to buff a guitar.

Oh you can definitely see some gloss spots if you look from another angle. Don't know how to get the really nice satin look that you see from factory ebmm for instance. You're right though, finishing was by far the most challenging and time consuming portion of the build.

[Bizman62]

8 hours ago, sadclevelandsports said:

Don't know how to get the really nice satin look

Back when I was much younger than today I needed some matte black paint for a project. You know, that sort of matte black that makes the painted spot look like a hole no matter the viewing angle or lighting direction. Absolute darkness. I'm digressing... Anyhow, the car paint shop mixed me some, adding the maximum amount of "matte agent" to the paint. If memory serves me right the mattifier was rather clear so it might have worked with a clearcoat as well.

The problem with all satin/matte finishes is that they will polish shiny where you constantly rub them. On an S-type guitar the most obvious spot is the forearm contour. And of course a sanded satin will polish sooner than the thoroughly matte.

Here's what I did on the neck of a factory built acoustic. The only tool was a sponge equipped with 400 and 12oo grit abrasive felts which I used wet. You can still see some directional scratches especially at the ends where I had to be careful not to tear or bypass the masking tape.

[henrim]

10 hours ago, sadclevelandsports said:

Oh you can definitely see some gloss spots if you look from another angle.

There are some spots visible in the picture. They are low spots and should level out by sanding. But of course there is always a risk of sanding through, so you have to think whether to take the risk or just accept them. You can try to hide the spots without levelling by going through the body with 0000 steel wool or a fine scotch pad. Soft abrasive may reach bottom of the spots and even them out.

In general, If you level before last layer of clear coat you always know how much you can sand back. Also if you want a really good matte finish, it has to come out of the paint gun. Spray it level. No sanding after the last coat. Much harder to get right than a gloss finish. 

As mentioned, you can try 0000 steel wool or a fine scotch pad to even out the matte finish. It's hard to even out all the swirls and you won't get true matte but an acceptable satin finish should be possible. I have done this on a French polished guitar top. Which, after all the hard work, was too shiny for my liking.