Bizman62

Hi and welcome!

The steel wool method your friend used is indeed valid and if done correctly you won't see any directional micro scratches. But you're right, every greasy fingerprint shows and won't go away by just wiping. You'd at least need something that removes grease - a clean microfibre cloth is good but as it will suck the oils from your skin as well you'll have to wash it regularly.

If the steel wool work has been done properly there's cleaners and protectants for matte paints and plastics, most likely you can find those for automotive use. Similarly you can adopt hints and tips for maintaining matte cars.

My wife just passed by my desk and commented "now that is an ugly guitar!" so you're not alone in thinking that it's a bit too much.

I'd start with a card scraper trying to get the drizzles off. You didn't mention whether you have one or not but they're inexpensive. Single edge razor blades or Stanley utility knife blades work as well. Or a japanese putty knife sharpened to have a scraper edge, or... Basically any steel plate can be used as a scraper as long as it doesn't bend to a sharp corner.

With luck the painting artist hasn't prepared the original surface properly, having left the original glossy finish as is with greasy fingerprints all over. In such a case you may even be able to use a plastic scraper to lift the artwork in relatively large chips. Try carefully cutting through the paint down to the original coat in spots that will be hidden by the scratchplate, bridge or jack socket. You may get lucky! I've got a natural Eko which at one point was painted grey with latex and the previous owner used a plastic windshield scraper to get it to the original shape. Some paints just don't blend!

It depends. I haven't marked any of my builds, nor do they have any logos or other signatures.

That said, I'd like to! After a decade and half a dozen or so builds it's already a bit tough to memorize the building order. Even a number like you do would help. Maybe I should get a silver marker or a punch set as long as I remember anything...

There's a guy in our group who uses a silver marker between layers of clearcoat for a signature, number and year. I sort of envy him for that.

If you sell your guitars I strongly suggest you to use a somewhat logical marking system. Build number with the headstock logo do suffice for identifying but after you and your notes are gone some enthusiast might also like to find the build year from the stamp.

3 hours ago, branded said:

The problem is that I can see the sanding/scuffing marks under the poly when shining on it with a light. I might be pedantic, but I thought it should be possible to avoid this somehow.

There seems to be so many opinions out there. Some say I should have worked my way up to 1500 grit before the first coat of poly, but that would mean the poly not adhering.

As you said you sanded up to 240 grit. In my opinion that's a bit on the coarse side, yet it shouldn't leave single scratches. My guess is that you've used a heavy hand and haven't cleaned the sandpaper too often. Let me explain: When pushing hard you're increasing friction which heats the surface which then will melt and reharden on the paper. So instead of a uniform layer of 240 grit abrasive you have lumps of rehardened mix of abrasive particles and finish. Adequate pressure for sanding is the weight of the block and your fingertips. It's more about repetitive wiping than forceful scraping. Same with machines, the weight of the sander (random orbital or vibrating) is plenty enough, you're just moving it around to prevent sanding through in one spot. No extra pressure. And clean off any buildup from the paper every so often.

Another trick for minor scratches is to sand along the grain. That can masquerade some scratches as parts of the natural figuration.

240 grit between layers of "paint" of any sort seems quite rough to me. For bare wood that can be enough depending on the finish but for plastic (yes, all poly is liquid plastic) I'd go a bit higher. A satin finish is the goal, the next layer should adhere to it. So instead of 240 I'd go up to 400 or even 600, potentially wet sanding. 1500 sounds high until maybe between the last two layers of clear or rather before buffing the final coat. In the latter case I'd go up to at least 2000, depending on the buffing method. For hand buffing I'd go even higher before using polishing compounds with mild abrasive.

Oh, and welcome!

That's a good approach if the intention is to restore an antique item to be fully original for museal purposes. However, in this case the new paint was already used to improve usability, to prevent the user from injure themself in the shards of the original finish. And the goal was to make the tool both safe to use and pleasing to the eye. Chipped clearcoat would be neither.

Removing layers of refinish from, say, a cupboard with original decorative painting is a totally different animal and that's where delicacy is the key. There's tons of vintage furniture and also musical instruments where the original finish has been "modernized" with latex or other covering paints. Cautiously revealing the original finish, spot restoring where necessary for functionality and applying a protective yet non-distructive and removable invisible layer is preserving our heritage.

Oh, and welcome to the forums!

4 hours ago, Asdrael said:

For a set neck, given wood glue expanding the wood, I think it would actually have been perfect (maybe next build but then with a longer tenon).

It's surprising how short a tenon is long enough for a set neck. If it's good for a bolt-on, it's good for gluing. Modern glues are that strong.

9 hours ago, Professor Woozle said:

Confession time... the bowing is in part due to me reprofiling the neck, I found the fretboard too wide so I took the binding off and spokeshaved/sanded the neck back, but in doing do I'll have reduced the cross-sectional resistance. Fingers crossed what I'm about to do works, as it's a great-sounding guitar!

That may be part of the issue. Then again, given that 12 strings double the string tension but no 12 string neck is twice as thick as a 6 string one some bow is to be expected sooner or later. Slimming the neck most likely just sped up the process some.

Once I tried an Ibanez Talman acoustic-electric. I liked the profile but every time I strummed a full chord the neck flexed. And I didn't even hit the strings hard. If your guitar doesn't do that you're already on the winning side!

1 hour ago, Asdrael said:

The piece wouldn't take more

It's a bit blotchy but otherwise the left side looks like a good start.  Much less sanding required and the subsequent dyes will darken the dark spots anyway. Unless of course you tried to apply dye to the right half as well, in that case it's a failure, the only positive thing being that you didn't try that on the actual build.

9 hours ago, Professor Woozle said:

rod thread feels OK too so I'm more confident about tightening the nut further. So, I'll see what I've got already in the way of copper washers

Sounds promising. And starting from the easiest solutions until you reach your goal is always recommendable.

You said in your first post that you felt like hitting the end point of the adjusting range which made me think that the nut met the end of the threaded part of the rod. Further thinking the issue could potentially be in the rod itself. As I understand it's a single action one and if it's inside a bowed channel any corrosion might grab. If that's the case, banging the neck all the length after tightening the rod should release any snugs.

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.

Listen to the master. Exactly my thoughts as well.

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.

9 hours ago, Professor Woozle said:

Would taking the nut off completely and putting some copper washers in front of it give that extra bit of tension needed to resist the pull?

That sounds like a viable solution. By your description it sounds like you've turned the nut down to the end of threading and taking the rod out for a few more rounds with the die equals to adding carbon rods. It's also possible that the shoulders for the nut have compressed a bit in which case I'd be tempted to glue in a hard wooden hollow plug as an extension. Fitting a ring of just a couple of mm can be tricky, though, but should be doable as the rod will act as a guide. A piece of straw would prevent the glue from sticking to the rod and a couple of washers along with the nut should take care of the clamping pressure.

That said, fibre washers glued in might work just as well as wood and they should be readily available. And of course a copper or brass washer as a bearing.

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

Sometimes it's better to take a time-out. And when you have such gorgeous woods at hands you don't have to think what to do with your spare time.

51 minutes ago, Asdrael said:

First, I would not settle for 60 and go for 240 or so

I hear ya. I actually had the finer grit paper with me but ran out of time. Didn't use a thickness gauge at that point as it was obvious that a) it was rocking when standing on edge and b) light could be seen from under the middle blocks of the opposite edge. It's a work in progress for moments when I can't do anything else.

Due to double booking the hiatus was longer so the last workshop day was yesterday. Started by planing the body blank and finally deciding which face will show and where to place the knot which became much smaller by planing just half a millimetre or so. Lighting can be funny, you can see my shadow holding the camera!

Last time I couldn't find the neck pieces which I remembered having selected at an earlier time. Well, whaddayaknow, they were just where they were supposed to be! Goes to show that when you've been working with the build for half a day and workshop time starts to run out you aren't as attentive as you should be. The woods are maple split from a one piece neck blank, beech and oak. The center strip had alternatives, I could have chosen from an unknown warm brown wood and padauk but when asking for opinions of fellow builders the consensus was for oak. For better contrast I also added thin veneers of birch.

Clamping time. For some odd reason the birch veneers became wider despite having measured them to match the beech.

While waiting for the glue to dry I then drew the outlines on the body blank, followed by estimating where the trem screws and bridge posts need a solid base . As the pencil lines weren't clearly visible I then decided to use a marker to prevent accidentally removing material from wrong places.

Hogging most of the hollow out with a forstner bit:

And it starts to look like something that has been carefully planned:

Onwards with the neck. Later at home I had to do some scraping just to see how I succeeded. The other maple strip is slightly low at both ends which indicates all pieces weren't dead straight. But that is well within tolerance.

We had to remove our property from the attic before the summer hiatus, unseen on the backseat is my tools and accessories bag and the Maderas Barber box of various pieces of wood. I'll have to run through all that to see what really is worth saving and what is firewood. The blocks with wide growth rings are Radiata Pine which was given to me by a stairmaker. Although there's a couple of blocks that would be glued to a body blank it's way too heavy for a comfortable guitar, being less than 10 cm longer and 15 cm wider than a Strat body they weigh 6.5 kg (14.3 lbs). Guess that would leave some 5 kg after cutting to shape. But then someone handed the idea of building a couple of stools for the sauna. That's going to be my summer project.

Thanks, that's the amplifier indeed on the uppermost picture. By the looks supposedly salvaged from one MS-4.

I guess the extra speakers and solid wooden(?) boxes make it sound much better than the original micro amp.

7 hours ago, PTModIT said:

There is no amp to work those 4 speakers , The guitar has 2 functions ,A normal guitar and it will play from the speakers. When a patch cord is plugged into the plug for the guitar and the other end plugged into the other input for the speakers you can walk to the corner store while playing a song, Then unplug for the stage performance. There is a circuit board that operates the 4 mini speakers. And separate volume and tone for the guitar

Had to read that three times to understand, hopefully right: So when you say there's no amp you apparently mean there's no big wall plug powered amp inside, but you can plug into one for stage performance.

My question was about the circuit board that operates the mini speakers. That's an amp too! And that's what I am a bit interested about.

I love horror stories with a happy ending. While reading about the buckle popping I first imagined that it bounced under the rotating bit and got cut into a thousand shrapnels which were then shot all around your body.

Goes to show that no matter how embarrassing you may look, keeping your calm is essential to prevent real accidents. Well performed!

Oh the beauty of insanity!

I had to check for MS4 to find out that it's that plastic thingy with 2.7" speakers. So if my math doesn't fail on me you've disassembled four of them for that build. Which leads me to the next question: What is the amp you're using to drive those speakers? And how much does that thing weigh?

12 hours ago, Asdrael said:

I think it looks good as it is now but before committing it might be worth trying out a finish if you plan on a transparent one. I think alder and Maple will react quite differently and you might have a hard line than you wished for.

True. My first build has a maple top on an alder body, finished with glass clear 2k poly. The alder is significantly darker. That said, as such the colours don't argue too much, yet the border can easily be seen. If you're going to use a transparent finish I strongly suggest you to try it on scrap pieces to see how the colours change. "Clear" finishes often have some sort of a hue which doesn't actually add anything but can strongly emphasize what's already there.

Both woods look great on their own. If that was my build I'd be tempted to make the center block narrower for a neck-thru look. And maybe even adding thin contrasting strips to separate the alder and the maple. But that's your build, not mine.

1 hour ago, Asdrael said:

I watched quite a few BigD guitars video and went back and forth, looking at my "gold standard" again, and I decided on black for my first try. I really want to enhance the figuring in the purple and try to make the contrast in the non purple part almost over the top. I figured black would be a good start.

Yes, black is somewhat of a standard at least for some builders and since you said you have plenty of scrap pieces for testing it's good to see how it turns out. With dark purple it might work well, with something like fire engine red brown would work better. With purple black/brown might also work since there's red in both colours. But I also strongly suggest you to try black/purple or even black/blue, with the blue being on the purple side instead of green. So Prussian Blue is not as recommendable as Ultramarine. If you're not familiar with various common blues this little video might help understanding the nature of some variables: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYH6zA3atfg

Now that was quite a rant! In a good way, though.

It's very true that anything that is dedicated to any hobby or other special use gets a higher price tag. Luthier and gunsmith are good examples but it applies to every imaginable group. Even if we're talking about aids for handicapped people: A 50"x40" piece of non slip mat for car rooftop bags or a carpet underlay of 80"x80" is about a tenner and even that has the extra price for dedicated usage. Guess they make them in huge rolls for retailers to cut. Cut that same mat into 5"x5" pieces and you can ask a tenner for a pair as they now have become jar opening aids for people with reduced strength!

2 hours ago, Satchmoeddie said:

I wish I could keep every part of room in the house at 74 degrees F, but it ain't ever gonna happen.

For me that would be a little too warm but each to their own. Enough of that side track. Speaking about metals shrinking and expanding, even if you could keep the room at that temperature using the tools would change their dimensions as soon as they get involved with your body temperature. After all they're very small compared to your body mass. Thus the optimal room temperature for hand measuring tools would be 98 degrees F. Then again, that would also change the properties of the pieces to be measured. Not to mention that working in such conditions isn't healthy.

Fortunately in luthiery we don't have to measure things that accurately. Inexpensive tools are good enough as the only measurement that requires high accuracy is the scale length which is both adjustable and dependent on sevaral variables like the quality and gauge of the string wire as well as the pitch. And of course positioning the frets which is a compromise in any case despite the improved ways to calculate it.

Using tape for marking the facets is ingenious! A pencil line will smudge way too easily and requires both good eyesight and lighting. And a marker may get too deep and stain spots permanently. And carving half a dozen necks out of cheap wood... That is something every budding luthier should do!

Regarding staining, I highly recommend you to try other than black for enhancing the figuration. Black as such often can look dirty and smudged whereas a dark brown may belong to the natural colour palette of almost any wood, even the palest ones. That said, since you're going for purple I'm a bit hesitant to recommend brown as it may blend with the main colour and the result may end up looking shit - literally. Instead I'd try with elements of purple like blue, red or even pink. Although the figuration often is made using a dark colour, I've seen it made with a lighter hue as well with great results. But it requires proper testing. So maybe starting with pink, sanding back, applying dark blue and sanding back and finally applying the purple might be very vibrant. 

Speaking of brown hues potentially making purple look dirty, do some testing with the finishes as well. Both TruOil and clear Osmo have a brown hue which can change the final colour. It's not only because of the colour within them, it's also about how they highlight the similar colours of the wood. Even though maple is pale, the real colour often actually is a very light brown. Neutral white maple is a rarity.

For flat pieces a random orbital is a great tool as it doesn't seem to leave marks. Your idea of sanding up to 400P with it and then raising the fibres and lightly hand sanding the fibres along the grain sounds very good.