PAINT, OR NOT TO PAINT

ICTGoober said:
What brand of lacquer will you buy? Don't forget you'll need thinner, and retarder. A clean, dry place to spray is nice, but my first lacquer job back in the 70's was in a dirt floor horse barn. It came out great, until a bug flew into my last coat of clear. Had to sand his sorry ass out, and touch up.
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I’m using aerosol lacquer. Automotive grade. Not Home Depot crap.
 
brentrocks said:
Another change. I’m doing lacquer now. Lol. I talked to a guy that used to spray for heritage guitars in Kalamazoo. He convinced me that lacquer was the way to go.

Now that the grain fill was dry, I put coat of shellac on it this morning to seal the oil in. I’m going to wet sand with 800 next and then spray the first coat of lacquer.
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Good call. Lacquer dries much quicker so you can apply multiple coats in less time. Poly doesn't do that. It just sits there collecting dust all day while while you're waiting for it to dry. lol!

And when you spray nitro lacquer over nitro lacquer it "melts" into the coat you're spraying over so it all kind of fuses together.

I'm a furniture designer and builder. Sprayed a lot of finishes.
 
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I think you should give it your best shot. Just do your research, plan everything out carefully, take your time, and do it right. I'm sure will be a great experience for you. You can buy a professionally finished guitar any time you want...
 
brentrocks said:
I’m using aerosol lacquer. Automotive grade. Not Home Depot crap.
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That doesn't really mean anything.

There are not "grades" of lacquer. There are types of binders used, types of solvents used, and various proprietary formulations. Catalyzed, non-catalyzed, nitrocellulose or acrylic, blends, lacquer thinner solvent, naphtha solvent, etc.

What "crap" does Home Depot have? Deft? That's a naphtha-solvent non-yellowing nitrocellulose lacquer that is good if applied with the right process. It dries more slowly than a lacquer-thinner-solvent lacquer, due to the naphtha solvent. But it's probably better for a traditional musical instrument finish than is something from an auto parts store, which will be acrylic lacquer. Fender used tons of acrylic lacquer color coats in the '60s (every metallic color except Sherwood Green were acrylic, and Oly White was too). But they used nitro clear over it. Gibson never used acrylic clear TMK. Acrylic clear has very rarely been used by any large scale musical instrument maker. It will not give your finish a traditional look. It is great for '60s style color coats, especially metallics, but as a clear coat, it doesn't look or behave like nitro. It's more "plasticky" looking, softer looking, doesn't hold shine for as long, doesn't really yellow, doesn't really check. It's a technological advancement over nitro, but won't give you the classic guitar lacquer look or feel.

I would avoid Deft and Color Tone, as they are naphtha-solvent lacquers, but most other rattle cans are pretty traditional nitro lacquer. Mohawk, for example. I'd go with them. Best combination of traditional lacquer and quality spray cans. ReRanch's lacquer is just as good, but their spray cans/nozzles are horrible.

That said, you can make Deft work fine if you apply it in dust coats, and allow it extra time to dry before re-coating. Flood coat at the end to level it. You can go straight to buffing compound without sanding if you have applied the lacquer well. It is readily available, very cheap, won't yellow, and comes in an outstanding can/nozzle.
 
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Crap I was referring to was actually the quality of the nozzle. I should have clarified. I’m using Dupli color. The nozzle is awesome.
 
I have another luthier friend here in town who swears by Duplicolor. I don't use it, but he has gotten outstanding results.
 
If you haven't bought the lacquer and sanding sealer yet, why not go to ReRanch and order it from them? I like their stuff. Works great.

I wouldn't use Deft. Wrong product. It's ok for do-it-yourself finishing of some door casing or crown molding (or maybe a home made coffee table) but it won't have the right look on a guitar.

https://www.reranch.com/
 
I did this guitar with rustoleum rattle cans (primer/colour/clear) earlier this year:
49916319956_6a8e875855_b.jpg49916324681_d6481c68ae_b.jpg


It was my first time painting an instrument and turned out reasonably well.



Just take things slowly. Make sure you have a clean, well lit, relatively dust free area to do the spraying. Do multiple thin coats. Wait longer than the can says for everything to completely cure. Prime/paint/clear coat is going to take you several weeks probably. I recommend Meguire's Ultimate compound followed by meguire's ultimate polish . . . rubbed in by hand to do the final finishing - it's pretty idiot proof.
 
GuitarStv said:
I did this guitar with rustoleum rattle cans (primer/colour/clear) earlier this year:
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That looks great. It's funny: typically, you'd think of Hot Pink as a "girl" guitar. But it's funny how many guys go for it too. I, myself, have a Hot Pink Strat. (Not an HK.) It's a kool color.
 
Th Dupli Color stuff is really good. I used it on my SG Junior build in 2011, Oxford White. Came out better than I expected with the "Faded" style finish I was going for (no grain filler, just a few coats of sanding sealer). If I could find Army OD green in Dupli Color I'd use it for my LP Jr DC project. My wife reached out to an auto repair guy we've used and he has a pint with clear coat waiting for me to pick up. I have a spray gun and ready to make part of the garage in to a spray booth. Still need to apply the grain filler and get it all ready for paint first.
 
ErikH said:
Th Dupli Color stuff is really good. I used it on my SG Junior build in 2011, Oxford White. Came out better than I expected with the "Faded" style finish I was going for (no grain filler, just a few coats of sanding sealer). If I could find Army OD green in Dupli Color I'd use it for my LP Jr DC project. My wife reached out to an auto repair guy we've used and he has a pint with clear coat waiting for me to pick up. I have a spray gun and ready to make part of the garage in to a spray booth. Still need to apply the grain filler and get it all ready for paint first.
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Check out Tamiya hobby spray paints for classic military colors like Olive Green and Panzergrau. It has been decades since I’ve used them, but they are alcohol-solvent acrylic lacquers IIRC. Maybe lacquer-thinner-solvent acrylic lacquers...but I don’t think so. I used to thin my bottled versions with denatured alcohol for use in my airbrush. But whatever they are, they look good, and will be available at any good hobby shop that sells armor model kits.
 
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ItsaBass said:
Check out Tamiya hobby spray paints for classic military colors like Olive Green and Panzergrau. It has been decades since I’ve used them, but they are alcohol-solvent acrylic lacquers IIRC. Maybe lacquer-thinner-solvent acrylic lacquers...but I don’t think so. I used to thin my bottled versions with denatured alcohol for use in my airbrush. But whatever they are, they look good, and will be available at any good hobby shop that sells armor model kits.
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Thanks. I actually reached out to them about using it on wood since they formulate it for plastic and was told it would not bond well to wood. Don't know the truth to that but I kept looking. The paint is ready from the auto shop, I just need to go get it and pay the guy.
 
ArtieToo said:
That looks great. It's funny: typically, you'd think of Hot Pink as a "girl" guitar. But it's funny how many guys go for it too. I, myself, have a Hot Pink Strat. (Not an HK.) It's a kool color.
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Thanks!

It's actually a neon colour . . . kinda glows in regular light. Really tricky to capture on camera as it ends up looking dark pink when you shoot the photo in low light, or bubblegum pink if you take the pic in bright light. But yeah . . . pink is a *****in' colour. I ended up swapping the pickups for an SSS configuration with white pickup covers and it's even more awesome looking now!
 
ErikH said:
Thanks. I actually reached out to them about using it on wood since they formulate it for plastic and was told it would not bond well to wood. Don't know the truth to that but I kept looking. The paint is ready from the auto shop, I just need to go get it and pay the guy.
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You wouldn't normally be spraying color coats over wood. You'd seal/fill, then prime first. Tamiya sticks fine to any lacquer-compatible sealer or primer. I like to use aerosol dewaxed shellac as my sealer, over a clay-like pore filler. Then I prime, with either black or white cheap acrylic lacquer, usually. White for light colors, and black for dark colors. I don't prime if it's a translucent color, or if I want the finish to wear down straight to the sealer without a primer color in between. In the latter case, I just use another pass of grain filler and sealer over the first application of those two steps.
 
ItsaBass said:
You wouldn't normally be spraying color coats over wood. You'd seal/fill, then prime first. Tamiya sticks fine to any lacquer-compatible sealer or primer. I like to use aerosol dewaxed shellac as my sealer, over a clay-like pore filler. Then I prime, with either black or white cheap acrylic lacquer, usually. White for light colors, and black for dark colors. I don't prime if it's a translucent color, or if I want the finish to wear down straight to the sealer without a primer color in between. In the latter case, I just use another pass of grain filler and sealer over the first application of those two steps.
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Where do you get this? I've sprayed it with an air gun, but ddidn't know you could buy a spray can of it.
 
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