mikhailgtrski

ill just post pics and sound clips and rub it in your face

Yeah well you did seem to need some psychological counselling to get you through the last month

Yeah, but I bet these 5 words send a shiver down your spine...

After a month's drying time...

I found this tutorial at frets.com. As long as it doesn't mess up the underlying stain, this might do it.

The top looked kinda -blah- because the finish sucked some of the stain up into it.

So I got the blade to track by tweaking the frame joint, but then the thing vibrated way too much.

I returned it to Lowe's. I think I'll wait and save up for a good quality 14".

Mike

You need to change the bulb in one of the lamps on your ceiling light

So you noticed that, eh? Could you also tell that one of the lamp sockets droops a little lower than the others? :D

The neck fits the pocket now, and I cleaned the excess lacquer out of the tuner holes. I leveled, re-crowned and polished the frets (that MicroMesh stuff is great) last night. It took a little more leveling than I expected, but that's another nice thing about those gi-normous 6100 frets... you can take a lot off and still have plenty of fret height.

Light at the end of the tunnel...

Mike

...Just a few fine scratches left in the recurve, where I couldn't get as much pressure with the pad. I can finish that up by hand. The neck fit is a little too tight now, so the pocket is getting a little cleanup sanding.

Mike

Shame you won't have any scrap to experiment on. Unless you want to wait another 45 days to make some. Can you reflow slightly and also dropfill a tiny amount whilst the finish is solvent?

I found some info in the MIMF library that might work...

CA isn't recommended for lacquer repairs - apparently it refracts light differently and is harder than nitro, making it difficult to level properly. Works well with poly finishes.

Thanks though, Pr3Va1L.

Anyone with experience, feel free to add your $0.02.

Congrats, Matt! I think you made the right call.

Sounds a bit like me, though, buying tools and having no workshop to put them in.

Mike

OK, so while I was being careful to keep the bridge stud and string-through holes dry during wet sanding, I forgot to keep an eye on the 5-way switch slot. The wood got just wet enough to swell and crack the lacquer between the slot and one of the mounting holes, and a little bit past that.

How would you go about repairing this? I'm guessing it would involve some very careful sanding (edit - or possibly cutting it out a bit to enlarge it into a "chip" that can be drop filled?)and some butyl cellosolve (or a similar solvent) to re-flow the lacquer, then some drop filling. I'll post a pic of the carnage tonight.

Thanks for the help.

Mike

You could use the short mahogany neck blank you have for the shaft and a seperate peice of wood for the headstock. You could either use another peice of mahogany that matches or use something different and make a feature out of it.

+1

My Warmoth mahogany neck had obviously different pieces for the shaft and headstock - different colors and grain patterns. Staining the neck dark brown erased the discrepancies - looks great now.

Mike

dunno about that crack though...you might have to strip it down to bare wood and start again

A pox on your house!

I did a more thorough buff out with the fine compound last night - kicked up the speed on the RO sander a couple of notches, and added time and pressure. After that I used the swirl remover on a foam finishing pad, turning the speed up a little more. I think I got just about all the sanding scratches out... again, it was late, so I'll reinspect tonight. I also got the neck sanded and buffed out (by hand ).

Some more pics: neck back back closeup top top closeup end view side

What exactly is this? What do you do about it? Is this a useless piece of abalone, ie: did I get screwed with this particular piece? (I'm refering to the huge mess of like "holes" in that one side,a dn then the other side has those little "tiger claw" marks in the center).

The "tiger claw marks" are from where the animal attaches to the shell - it's called "abalone heart". It's not useless, in fact, it looks really nice when it's buffed out. It just doesn't match the "normal" abalone.

The second fret from the right has a bit of heart material. I used the reverse (outside) of some heart blanks to do some headstock lettering.

I don't know where you got yours, but DePaule lets you know that their ounces of paua blanks occasionally include some heart material.

Mike

Where the light is in the lower treble bout I can still see sanding scratches Maybe i'm just a perfectionist but that would bug me to no end. If you're satisfied with it, then I am too (minus the sanding scracthes. )

Anyone ever heard of a gold top and bottom?

Warmoth do a few of those in van halen & srv configs.

The random-orbit sander works great for buffing.

I set it to its slowest speed, loaded the Meguiar's foam pad with fine compound, and let it do its thing. Soooo easy - you don't have to anchor the body down while you buff the front and back, and you can hold the body upright for doing the sides and work the sander/buffer with your free hand.

Mike

Finally...

Today (6 weeks after the final lacquer coat) I sanded with 800 FreCut (dry), then wet sanded with 1000/1200/1500/2000 Unigrit. I buffed it out with Stewmac fine compound, using my random-orbit sander with a Meguiar's foam pad. I'll do the swirl remover later, once the neck is buffed out.

front back reflection

Elation was soon tempered, though, when I discovered a nasty lacquer split at the slot for the 5-way... I was being so vigilant about keeping the bridge stud and string-through holes dry, I completely forgot about that slot. Arggghhh. Hopefully it's something I can repair later.

I'm going to have to find my manual on the thing to see it's specs just to be sure, but I remember in the DVD's Dan said to have the oscillations low.

OK, I watched the video (twice) and Dan doesn't mention anything about speed or oscillations on the RO sander. If I can find some hook/loop pads locally I might test it on scrap. I'll also try the drill press setup... kinda like a poor man's pedestal buffer? Between 800-1000 rpm should be good, if I recall.

If you want to improve the tone of your guitar get a bone nut and saddle and have it professionaly setup.

That's pretty funny...

Small world, or so they say... Stretch Island Fruit Co. is located on the same peninsula where I live, in fact, we (aka the now-defunct family electrical contracting business - R.I.P.) wired their new warehouse.

I have a question for ya, do you have a drill press (i'm assuming no). I mount my foam pads in my drill press and buff bodies out using that now, it works great!

I have the same RO sander as you, and i'd personally never use it to buff guitars. For one, with the variable speed ones you can set the oscillations, and I think the RO oscillates too much ( i think oscillates is the word).

I'm going to have to find my manual on the thing to see it's specs just to be sure, but I remember in the DVD's Dan said to have the oscillations low.

Actually, I have a Ryobi 12" drill press. Hadn't thought of using it like that... hmmm...

I have the Spray Finishing Basics VHS, but I haven't watched it yet - still reading the book. Maybe Dan covers the RO buffing thing in there? Something to check out tonight...

Stewmac's Guitar Finishing Step-By-Step talks about buffing with a random-orbit sander, that it's easier than the variable-speed drill method... anyone ever tried it?

I've got a little Ryobi 5" RO sander, and I was thinking these might work well with it.

Thanks for the input.

Mike