Near Completed Squier refinish

[thop]

My first guitar was a black 96 squier strat. When I got a nicer one a few years later, this became a backup. I put American Standard pickups in it and I decided to sand down and spraypaint it silver. Didn't bother to learn the proper way to do it, I kind of liked the weird crackliness of it anyway. Unfortunately when I tried to sell it, I learned that no one else shared my aesthetic preferences. So I figured it'd be good practice to strip it and do it right.

 

Here are some before and afters. Not professional looking, but I took a lot of care and it's a huge improvement. I haven't put it back together yet, I just laid it out. Should I wait a while for the finish to set before putting it back together? Or is that only for nitro finishes? I just used a clear gloss lacquer finish.

[Belva]

On that last pic you forgot to paint the foot!:poke:

What type of paint did you use? Also, any type of paint can be rubbed out and polished. Poly just takes longer than lacquer. But def a 1000% improvement. Nice work.

[mike42]

I'd give it a few days to cure, (maybe even let it sit out in the sun), before you put it back together. Otherwise, you'll probably end up lifting some of the finish the next time you take anything off of it. Even then, when you put to pg back on, I'd use just enough tension to hold it in place for a week or two.

[thop]

 

On that last pic you forgot to paint the foot!:poke: What type of paint did you use? Also, any type of paint can be rubbed out and polished. Poly just takes longer than lacquer. But def a 1000% improvement. Nice work.

 

 

Haha, finally a joke! Everyone is always so serious in the DIY forum (no offense guys). I used regular hardware store silver paint. I know auto stuff or specialty paints are better, but I wanted to keep the same sort of beat-up punk rock vibe. If I'm doing the work I'd rather have a really personal, unique and organic looking finish than have something that looks like everyone else's guitar. Only reason I wouldn't refinish all my guitars like this is because I know it'd ruin the resale value.

 

If I don't get a decent price for this one, I'm thinking of stenciling something onto the body in black and adding a black pickguard. 2 of my roommates are artists, maybe they can help me design something. Should be a little more interesting to share than a 2nd rate spraypaint job.

 

My next project is gonna be staining which I have absolutely no experience with. I'll have to practice on some scrap for a while. I guess if it comes out that horrible I can always just paint over it though. If that's case I'll be taking much more care and using some glossier paint and finish.

[katillac]

 

My next project is gonna be staining which I have absolutely no experience with. I'll have to practice on some scrap for a while. I guess if it comes out that horrible I can always just paint over it though. If that's case I'll be taking much more care and using some glossier paint and finish.

 

No way, dude, do like me and just sand the damned thing down to bare wood again a few times! Staining can be fun!

 

*snrk*

[WRGKMC]

Just mix the oil based stain with tung oil and coat it till its as dark as you want it then just apply clear tung oil over.

[thop]

 

Just mix the oil based stain with tung oil and coat it till its as dark as you want it then just apply clear tung oil over.

 

 

Ha, that's easy for you to say. That's like saying "yeah, just sand it til it's smooth and lay the paint on". Haha, I'm not worried though, so far I haven't made any major boners on any projects. It's a good exercise in patience, I'm usually a big rusher, but I'm learning to slow down. This'll be my first build from scratch, I'll probably start in a few weeks, still gotta finish rewiring a semi-hollow and refinish the neck and drill and add 2 extra pots to my samick/sx hybrid LP.

[WRGKMC]

Its not just easy to say its easy to do, thats why I mentioned it.

[thop]

I believe you. Thanks for the tip about the tung oil actually. Now that I think about it I do have a question about staining. I filed down a mahogany neck on an lp copy a few weeks ago and I used wood filler to smooth out a few poc marks. I figured I wouldn't care about the difference in color, it's only a few tiny patches and it's a $100 guitar. But now im starting to think I want it a little more pristine. It may be cheap but it is new. Any way I can stain it to match better? Maybe just strip it again and stain some wood filler before applying? Or would I need tojuat paint over it in a solid color to hide it?

[mike42]

I've had pretty good luck on several projects using home-brew touchup "stains" made from thinned paint. The plastic type filler won't absorb much of anything, and if it's white or light colored to begin with, stain won't penetrate, so it stays white, and looks awful. A paint based "stain" will at least color it, and if you get the fill areas a little darker than the overall wood it usually doesn't look bad. Fills that are darker than the base color are almost always better than ones that are lighter.

 

If you use some of the pre-colored filler, and guess right about a color match with the final wood color, you can get fills that are just about invisible.

 

edit: to clarify; I would only use the paint "stain" on the fills themselves; I wouldn't try to do a whole piece that way.

[WRGKMC]

 

I've had pretty good luck on several projects using home-brew touchup "stains" made from thinned paint. The plastic type filler won't absorb much of anything, and if it's white or light colored to begin with, stain won't penetrate, so it stays white, and looks awful. A paint based "stain" will at least color it, and if you get the fill areas a little darker than the overall wood it usually doesn't look bad. Fills that are darker than the base color are almost always better than ones that are lighter. If you use some of the pre-colored filler, and guess right about a color match with the final wood color, you can get fills that are just about invisible. edit: to clarify; I would only use the paint "stain" on the fills themselves; I wouldn't try to do a whole piece that way.

 

 

If its a lacqured body you can buy lacquer sticks that match your finish.

If you know how lacquers bond, one finish will melt into the old to make one single layer.

Lacquer sticks make a completely transparent fix that chamically bond with the old finish.

http://www.stewmac.com/shopby/item/1916-MM?utm_source=google&utm_medium=shopping&utm_campaign=2011-08-gp%22

To apply them you burn them in with a hot knife.

 

Lacquer is the only finish that you can do transparent repairs on and it why many manufacturers still use it.

Poly is harder and will resist damage to begin with. After it occurs, a completely transparent fix is not possible.

Oil finishes are easy to apply, but again, spot fixes are not transparent. Lacquer is the best product for repairability

like an instrument that can get gets banged around. Its fairly easy for the average DIYer to get a pro job refinishing with it too.

 

 

As a note, If the finish is laquer, you should "only" use lacquer to do the repair. No paints etc. Putting the wrong stuff on there only

makes a that much tougher when it fails.

[thop]

Finished! Gotta say, all put together, it looks kinda purty. I still need to buy some new string trees, they're a little too rusted. If I keep it, I'll probably get a black pickguard and cut it kind of like a musicman.

 

Another thing, I accidentally wired the pickups to the five-way backwards, so that the position closest to the bridge activates the neck pickup and vice versa. I'll switch it back, but it has kind of a cool tone this way. Shouldn't it sound exactly the same? For some reason it's still got a sharp twangy tone when I activate the bridge, but fuller, and the bridge pickup sounds fuller too. I didn't tune it or anything, just plugged it in and strummed it for a minute to test, maybe I'm imagining it.

 

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[ATTACH=CONFIG]337734[/ATTACH]

[katillac]

Way to go, thop! I think a black pickguard would look sexy on it. Maybe black or chrome knobs, too. Is the traditional Music Man style pickguard the one you're referring to? I kinda like that shape. Kinda like a cartoon pork chop. Honest, guys, I haven't been drinking.

 

You said bridge twice. I reckon you mean the bridge is twangy and the mid or neck pickup sounds fuller. Are you sure you didn't put the pickups in the reverse order, too? You wouldn't be the first. It's why I write the info with a Sharpie on a piece of tape and wrap it to the wires. I'm more apt to forget which colour was for which pickup. I just realised I should take pictures, too.

[WRGKMC]

You just need to swap the bridge and neck wires on the switch around.

You are likely imagining a difference in tone. The refinishing may have a little to do with it, reseating the bridge,

or just not having your ears acclimated to the sound in a long time.

[Belva]

WRG is correct when it comes to "fixing" the switching. But I recommend trying it for a while. I have a customer that has had me do this "mod" to 2 of his guitars. He says it's easier for him to get the sounds he wants on the fly. I'm not gonna argue. He fooking smokes on a Strat and I get paid too. Not only money but education. This guy won't even change his own strings. I get a free guitar lesson whenever he's here and that's a big bonus for me. I'm starting to become less of a hack and more of a guitar player.

BTW very nice work. And if you want to see more joking here, start a thread about guitar nuts. I always have a field day with those. Sooner or later you'll wanna learn to do your own nuts. This comes in handy when the wife is mad at you.:poke:

[thop]

 

Way to go, thop! I think a black pickguard would look sexy on it. Maybe black or chrome knobs, too. Is the traditional Music Man style pickguard the one you're referring to? I kinda like that shape. Kinda like a cartoon pork chop. Honest, guys, I haven't been drinking. You said bridge twice. I reckon you mean the bridge is twangy and the mid or neck pickup sounds fuller. Are you sure you didn't put the pickups in the reverse order, too? You wouldn't be the first. It's why I write the info with a Sharpie on a piece of tape and wrap it to the wires. I'm more apt to forget which colour was for which pickup. I just realised I should take pictures, too.

 

 

Yeah, I think the porkchop pickguard is much more unique. Most of what I don't like about strats is their ubiquity.

 

Sorry for the confusion, I meant that when I flick the toggle to the bridge position (activating the neck pickup), it sounds twangier than I remember the neck pickup being, and when I flick the toggle the other way, the bridge pickup sounds fuller than I remember.

I'll tune it up today and see if I'm imagining it. I might just have to reset the heights or something. It's an easy fix, I knew there was a chance it would work out this way, I figured I only had a 50% chance of getting the switch correct before I started soldering, thats why I didn't bother to tune up.

[thop]

Oops! Figured out the tone thing. Since the switch was reversed, the bridge pickup was wired to a tone pot and it was turned all the way down, haha! Thats why it sounded so much darker.

 

Anyway, I've decided not to keep it. I just don't like the tone anymore. I may have made some more mistakes with the pickups though. It sort of wavers, like it's got a slight tremolo effect on it. Bad connections maybe? When I open it up to fix the switch I'll check everything.

 

If I can't get $100 bucks for it, I'll just sell the pickups and body for cheap and keep the neck to use on my Rejectomatic semihollow which has a warped one. It's the wrong scale, but that means I'll have to try and make my own floating jazz bridge out of surplus wood! {censored} yeah garbage guitar!

[Belva]

YOU HAVE DIY DISEASE!!!

I'd suggest getting professional help but there is no cure. Once you start you never can stop. Pretty soon you'll be looking to start a project just to use up parts in your pack rat stash. And Pack Rat Syndrome, PRS is an associated affliction. But more parts will be added in your attempt to use them up.

[thop]

Got $135 on ebay! I'm pretty happy as I listed it like 4 times before the refinish and couldn't even get an $80 bid. So that means my hours and hours of labor were worth about 50 bucks. I'm moving up the luthier ladder, watch out pros!

[Belva]

 

Got $135 on ebay! I'm pretty happy as I listed it like 4 times before the refinish and couldn't even get an $80 bid. So that means my hours and hours of labor were worth about 50 bucks. I'm moving up the luthier ladder, watch out pros!

 

So you made, what, ten cents an hour? Prolly less if you count the cost of paint, sandpaper and other related stuff. You may even have gone in the red. But who cares? It's the fun for me. I had a yard sale this weekend and got rid of two amps and two guitars. Now I have some money for another project. Like I said, it's a disease.