Twiz420

Thanks guys

Re-assembled Finished headstock Finally strung up Well those are the best photos I have of the project. I changed all the electronics in it, its wired up with 2 Seymour Duncan SH8 Invader pickups, 2 Bourns push/pull 500k volume pots for series/ parallel w/ .001 caps for a treble bleed circuit, 2 mini SPST toggles for coil cut, Gotoh 3 way toggle, 500k/500k CTS concentric pot for individual tone control w/ Sprague Orange Drop caps, 1 Sanwa arcade button kill switch (red) and 1 Seimitsu arcade button kill switch (black player 1), a SPST toggle kill switch. It was an electronics nightmare (I'm not very good with electrical work) but all in all it was a fun project and I'm quite happy with the results. The decals worked out quite well, but they are noticeable up close. My printer doesn't print the exact same shade of black as my paint, which is very noticeable even from a distance with a super high gloss finish, this is why I went with a more satin finish, ending with p2000 grit wet sandpaper. It is much less noticeable of the difference in the shades of black when it has a matte or satin finish unless your really close and the light is hitting it just right. I had to print the decals on white decal paper so they would show up on the black paint, but doing this left hairline white edges on each decal so I brushed on some black to cover that up before adding the clear. If I do another project like this I will probably bust out the detail brushes and fill in all the black on the decals with the same paint on the guitar so I can polish to a high gloss. Well that's about it, any questions feel free to ask. I hope you enjoy the photos and thanks for letting me share.

Headstock decals in place Body decals final layout Starting the clear coat, I used Rustoleum lacquer, about 3 cans all together for the neck and body 'Signed' the rear of the headstock with a decal Galaga dragon on the rear of the body Shielding cavity Wired up

Hey everyone, I came on here a few months ago asking for info on decals for my project. After some experiments I finally got everything worked out and the project has come to an end. I figure since I've used this site for info on all my guitar projects so far I'd like to share some photos of this one with you all. Here's what I started out with, a standard NJ series warlock Sanded down Cavity extension for kill switch Neck getting a coat of black Designing decal layout Decals printed out, edited in GIMP, printed with Kodak photo printer Adding white bevel and faux white binding unmasked Hole for second kill switch

Lol no control wheels I'm running out of room for electronics on this thing. I do want to build an arcade themed guitar from the ground up with a joystick mounted on it as well as game buttons. Just not sure what I will make it do possibly pitch bending, wah or some sort of phase control. Granted that project will most likely be a synth guitar project with a GK pickup or something like that.

Yes I will be using 600g wet then 1200g or 1500g wet paper on the black before adding decals.

Looks nice man, can't tell there's an edge in the picture. I put some thought into the raised surface of the decals (even though its not much) and bought an extra can of lacquer so hopefully when mine is done it will have a nice level surface. I just ordered 10 sheets of waterslide paper last night 5 white and 5 clear they should be hear on Monday. I did a test layout to make sure all the images are the proper size last night as well, I just printed on regular paper on draft setting. Here's one of the layouts and most likely the one I will be going with

Thank you, and will do. I am hopefully ordering the decal paper sometime this week so my experimentation will probably start next week.

Ha ha thanks, I decided on Galaga because I just added a big red arcade button kill switch to my guitar and I remember Galaga having just the one red button. Plus it's still my favorite space shooter game. It suits the guitar too imo, I'm putting it on an 80's NJ series warlock. I'm gonna do some testing with decal paper, I'll be getting both clear back and white back. I'll try just white back over black paint and see if they're visible, painting a white silhouette and using clear back decal over that and hope I can line them all up properly, and enamel paint with unprinted clear decal over it and see if it protects it from the clear lacquer. Hopefully one will be successful. I'll be sure to post some photos of which ever works out for me and the whole thing when it's finished. Thanks for all your input

These are enlarged a bit to show their detail better, they don't have much detail but enough to make me want to either print decals or hand paint. I would be able to spray the base color of each character and possibly hand paint the rest. and here's the logo I plan on putting on the headstock this would be pretty hard for me to spray I'm kinda new to the area so I don't know anyone who does airbrush work or anything like that. I'm also on a tight budget for this project with the holidays coming up. I did come up with an idea that should allow me to print my own decals though. I have some white spray paint left from another project and I can make stencils of the characters the exact size they will be on the guitar then just spray a white background wherever I plan on putting them. then I just have to be uber careful when applying the decals so they cover up all the white.

The printer I plan on using will print out the colors I need since they are very basic colors. I'm having trouble finding those same colors in lacquer paint that I can brush on, and that would be the only way I can do the detail. The only lacquer colors in jars I've found are for model cars and most of them are various shades of blue and things like turn signal amber. I've found more colors in 3oz spray cans that are close but not all the ones I need and I cant do the small details with spray. I can find pretty much every color I need in enamel paint but that wont work with a lacquer top coat if I remember correctly. Would putting a clear with no print on it decal over the enamel protect it from the lacquer when I do the clear coat?

Hey guys and gals I'm new here not sure if I'm posting in the right section but I think I am lol. So I'm refinishing a guitar of mine and I'm planning on putting graphics on the body and doing a custom logo on the headstock, specifically I want my guitar to look like a Galaga game is being played on the body. I've already started to lay down the black paint for the background of the 'game' and I plan on finishing it all with lacquer since I have plenty of it and no other suitable clear coat. Since I can't find all the colors I need in jarred lacquer paint to do all the characters and the logo I was thinking of using water slide decals and I don't have much experience with these. I've read that the clear ones are best used with light backgrounds and will make the ink fade into the black and wont be to visible if at all. So I was wondering if I got the white background sheets would it have the same effect as the clear? Or should they remain visible over the black background? Sorry for the long post and thank you for any help or advice you can give it is much appreciated. Tom