Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Here is a how to thread, on how to paint a guitar from a rattle can,,, O.K., lots of rattle cans, with excellent results!! I bought this guitar , 99' Squier Strat from a guy who bought it new and NEVER played it. The guitar played exceptionally well for what he was asking and was in almost perfect shape minus a couple of tiny dings on the body. Frets were brand new and never touched. The guy didnt play guitar. I gave him 50.00 for it and he was completely happy. I considered it a score! I never really fell in love with the color, sorry Stratogirl, looks excellent on you, but after seeing a recent guitar Atrox was working on, and LOVING the color, I sought out a similar color, and I decided to paint it. Before After Nevermind the zebra striped pic guard, I did that one night with a Sharpie when I was bored, because I knew it would just wipe off with a lil' denatured alcohol if I didnt like it. You can see where the sharpie smeared during the weeks I played it. Anyway, let the painting begin!! First step is to strip the guitar of EVERYTHING that is not wood, down to the bare body. The next step was to prep the body for paint and body work, by removing all the glossy top layer of the poly paint. I used 320 grit Wet/dry paper to sand the guitar completely untill it was dull, all traces of gloss removed. There is ABSOLUTELY no need to strip the guitar down entirely to bare wood in order for this technique to work effectively, however, if you do not strip it, as the guitar relics with time, wear marks, dents and druises, you will see the underlying color in the damaged areas and they will be quite noticeable due to the huge variance in the two colors. Personally, I am not worried about that and I am not interested in all the extra work taking the guitar down to bare wood. This thread is a demonstration on how to easily achieve great results with very basic materials and techniques. A nicer guitar with a more beat up body, with lots of gouges, buckle rash, massive amounts of chips, etc, I would more likely strip to bare wood, but it is ALOT of extra work. Anyway, the purpose of the 320 grit deglossing sand job is to give the new paint a slightly rough surface to bite into and grip onto. Just keep rinsing the paint-sand clogged paper every few seconds as you go. I put in a couple of drops of dish soap for a little lube too. Not much, just barely enough to make it a tiny bit slippery. NOT MUCH! Here is the sanded body shown with most of the gloss removed.... almost done after about 15 minutes of sanding by hand. Do not use an electric sander!!!! Some people can get away with this on the flat surfaces only, but for the inexperienced, it is way too tempting to take the sander to the edges too, which, even with 360 grit paper, will chew right through poly to the wood before you even realize it and it will also leave a flat spot where there was once a nice factory three dimentional curve. Even holding the sander on a curve for less than a second will do this.. Don't do it, it is just not worth it, unless you have total confidence in your sanding abilities, and it is quick enough by hand anyway. I actually finished sanding it beyond what that pic shows, to completeness. Next step is to do a little body work on the few dings that were present. You can see them as little glossy areas that didnt get sanded due to being indented. First, i pressed the sand paper down into the dings with my fingertip to rough up the surface in the indentations that didnt get sanded before. Then I simply used autobody spot putty filler and sort of filled the holes with a scraping motion using an old credit card. After letting that ^^^ dry for a few minutes (it dries really fast) I sanded it smooth with the same grit paper and did another couple of skim coats with the body filler and resanded until it was totally filled and smooth. Then I wiped the body clean of all debris and dust with a new microfiber cloth and some Methyl Ethyl Keytone(MEK). The body is now ready for paint. OOPS!! No pics of the totally prepped body. Oh well, it looks just like the prefilled body only with a couple of smoothly filled dings. I was impatient to get started, so after checking around at a few places for paint, auto parts stores, home depot and whatnot, yes, I know about Reranch, etc, but I wanted to go TODAY!, so I found this stuff at a local hobby shop. It is a laquer marketed for plastic but will work on all kinds of surfaces, dries really hard, and poly is basically a plastic anyway(almost), so it is compatible. And Holy COW!! What a color. The cap on the can was a PERFECT color and I only hoped the paint would actually come out that way in reality. The paint is a pearlescent seafoam green, and simply said "Pearl Green" on the can. Sorry, the flash wiped out almost all color in the pic, but you can kind of see it on the edges of the can. Anyway away we go!!!............... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Willeh Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 impressive! nice one! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Crappymonkey Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Sexy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Burningleaves Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Well done:thu: Easy "how to" as well. Should help some folks out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sheepeH Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Damn!!plx pictures of the guitar strung up, that color is hot as hell! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members funkymonk937 Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Beautiful, I wanna see it assemble now!!! pics soon? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Geeter Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 I look forward to the next installment Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rock-lobster Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Yes, pics on the way. Give it a min......... Sorry for the confusion... If you are confused, some people actually saw the guitar in a post that I deleted and moved to the end of the thread for clarity... I had to rearrange the photo order.... Anyway, stand by...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 After spraying on a couple of coats and being WAY too impatient, I knew I had to stop, and back up as I ended up with all kinds of sags, runs, drips, etc from holding the can way too close, and just trying to get WAY too much paint on there too fast. Sad part is, I know better, but I did it anyway. Yes, I am anal, but it was actually alot worse than you can see in this photo. So, after a night of drying, and resanding, we are ready for round two. No big deal yet, I still only have about an hour into this..... The guitar is totally smooth again, all drips etc, gone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 THIS is the EXCELLENT thing about this kind of DIY project.... If you mess it up, no big deal, a little sanding and a few dollars worth of paint wasted..... just start over..... nothing is actually ruined. Afetr about 6 coats of paint reapplied almost flawlessly laid on, way more patience this time, holding the can further, and taking my time, letting it dry between coats, I was back to where I was before, only with an almost flawless and smooth job. I could have probably called it done there, BUT I WASNT FINISHED YET!!!!!!! To be continued in a few minutes with pics...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rock-lobster Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 i'm running out of chips!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FckStick Jones Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Looks good, but you dont need 6 coats of color. Two will do then hit it with multiple coats of clear. Thats were the protection is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 So, Like I said.... I wasnt finished yet. Here we go.... I just HAD to get some really high gloss clearcoat Laquer on there. Actually alot of types of clearcoat would work, I just chose this laquer, because it was ultra high gloss, dries ultra smooth(supposedly), I have worked with lacquer alot in the past, it has an ultra deep glossy wet look, and it was readily available at my local Mega hardware store. I SSSSSLLLLOOOOWWWWLLLYYY applied TWO whole cans of laquer clear coat, over a period of a few hours, letting each coat mostly dry inbetween coats, with just only a tiny bit of tackyness left before each new coat. This eliminates the step of having to slightly wet sand between coats if you let them dry. Anyway, a couple days later, I have an almost flawless finish and a beautiful color for about 30.00 worth of paint and clear coat, including the wasted paint, and would probably be even less, but I paid a little more as the hobby shop paint was a little more expensive. You can find cheaper paint of excellent quality. I dont know if these pics do justice to how deep of a luster and shine this gloss laquer has, but it looks like it was dumped in a vat of liquid sugar an was left to dry into a big pearl green piece of mouthwatering candy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Looks good, but you dont need 6 coats of color.Two will do then hit it with multiple coats of clear. Thats were the protection is. Actually, coat is prabably not the right word as I was applying it somewhat thinner than actuall coats. Since I was working with a rattle can, I just wanted to be VERY carefull not to lay it on too thick, and mess it up AGAIN, so alot of the paint went to waste as it was sprayed from a safer distance, of about 8 to 12 inches away, probably mostly closer to 12. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Anyway, even though the guitar is shiny, there is still quite a bit of orange peel in the laquer, and this is the point I am up to now. I will let it cure for a while, a few more weeks, or however long it takes, and then I will buff the poop out of it. The laquer went on super thick, and I couldnt even tell you how many coats I got out of two cans. I lost count but it had to be at least 15 coats. Should be plenty there to buff. Here is a pic showing some more gloss, but also alot of the orange peel, which will buff out into a mirror finish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 So, that is about it for now, except, OH yeah, I bought this beautiful mother of toilet seat pic guard to go with it, and here is a pic of the guitar with the picguard, and the rosewood neck. Note the nice figure, streaks, in the rosewood fingerboard. I am more of a maple or ebony fingerboard fan, but I think this is actually working really well with these colors so far. So now, I am just waiting for the buffing to be finished, to reassemble the guitar, until the next mod I do on it, coming in a feww weeks or so, with pups, bone nut, maybe a couple of other things too. I will post follow up pics when the buffing is done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Electric Blues Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Great job!!! I'd love to see some pictures once you buff it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarcapo Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 I usually use Home Depot Painter's Touch and French polish spirit shellac over it. Here's a 1961 Gretsch Twist guitar I had to refinish because it was trashed by the previous owner. I got it cheap for that reason. I also threw a late 60's Supertron in there. I also tossed a couple decals under the French polish... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members dcindc Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlackHatHunter Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 great job! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted February 17, 2008 Author Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 I usually use Home Depot Painter's Touch and French polish spirit shellac over it. Here's a 1961 Gretsch Twist guitar I had to refinish because it was trashed by the previous owner. I got it cheap for that reason. I also threw a late 60's Supertron in there. I also tossed a couple decals under the French polish... Awesome job. I love the pinups. Looks nice and smooth. I cant wait to get mine buffed and done. I am going to give it quite some time. Really only takes a few hours for the laquer to dry, which it is now, but Alot longer to be completely cured. I cant press a fingerprint into it with my thumb, but I can put a tiny dent in it with the side of my nail. Dont worry, I tested it in the pup rout. Nowhere near ready for buffing yet. I will just have to wait.................... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Zawam Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 very nice and definitely very impressive, nice one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Tweedledee Posted February 17, 2008 Members Share Posted February 17, 2008 Excellent! I'm going to be starting a similar project (surf green!) once this horrible Chicago winter finally comes to an end. Thanks for the step-by-step narrative and all the photos. Can't wait to see it once you buff it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bendafender Posted February 18, 2008 Members Share Posted February 18, 2008 Very impressive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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