Simon B's Custom ES-1/ES330 style build

[JohnH]

How many applications of dye did you use, Mark?

[Simon Barden]

I just tried the stain with some white paper dipped in it. Definitely coming out purple. It may have suffered from being stored in an unheated garage for 2 years.

Going to try and mix up a better red. I have got another reddish stain, so I'll try it out with some paper dips before trying it out on the guitar.

[Simon Barden]

Found the other red stain - Indian Red, and it was what I should have used in the first place (though wanted it a slightly less vibrant red than your Epi Jr, King Casey) . But I've just rubbed some on the back and sides, and it's already transformed then into nearly what I wanted. I'll wait for it to dry, then give the top a light rub down then stain that. Probably need at least one more coat all round after that.

Phew!

[Simon Barden]

Just put on a coat of Yellow on top of the Indian Red on the back and sides. Looks pretty damn near perfect now. Let's hope the top goes the same way. Will take pictures when it's dry.

[king casey]

Hi John. I put about 3 coats on. The first one I distinctly remember showed a patchiness not dis-similar to Simon's.

(though wanted it a slightly less vibrant red than your Epi Jr, King Casey)

I did shoot that picture in full sun with a dodgy Nikon

The point is now redundant I guess.

cheers, Mark.

[Simon Barden]

A lot of the 'patchiness' in the first photo and third photos are reflections due to the low sun angle. You have to remember it's currently winter here, and I'm at around 51.43°N, so the sun doesn't rise that far above the horizon at the moment (though it's improving).

My yellow stain isn't as yellow as it used to be, so that's either oxidised or been affected by low temperatures as well. So the guitar is now more of a deep (solid and non-patchy) maroon red rather than the purple it was before (and not as light as my Photoshopped red). Looks great when wet, so hoping for a good result once the Tru-oil goes on.

[JohnH]

Glad you found a resolution Simon!

[Simon Barden]

Well I've just finished scraping all the binding, so consider all the staining complete. It's 11.35pm here, so hopefully tomorrow morning will be bright enough to allow some pictures to be taken.

I need to finalise my headstock logo as the headstock face is the next thing to do before I can start with the Tru-oil on the neck (apart from fitting a bone nut - must order some more ans I've used all my stock up!).

I've got Tru-oil's own sanding sealer compound, so if I can't spot any glaring errors that need fixing in the daylight and with a fresh set of eyes, I'll be applying that to the body tomorrow.

[Simon Barden]

Well, some daylight showed I had a little bit of scraping left to do. So I've done that (though I'll need another go in places looking at the photos in close-up) and this is what the body now looks like. It's an overcast day, so it would probably look a touch redder in bright sunlight:





I'll admit it's not a 100% even stain, but that was the take-up of the veneer, so I can't really do much about that. The back is a bit more patchy, but again that seems to be down to the ply. The finest grit I used before dyeing was 180, so haven't over-polished. But I'm less concerned about the back, it is what it is.

It's not quite the colour I wanted, but I'm happy with it. Depending on the light it can look quite brown, so I didn't want to add any more stain as it was likely to end up like mixed-up coloured Plasticine - very brown. It's going to ago a bit darker and possibly a touch more maroon with the Tru-Oil on, as that is what it looked like when wet. Or it may go a bit more orange with the amber Tru-Oil tint. We shall find out.

As I've said earlier, the veneer join line was straight and I didn't find any glue spots.

Here's a close-up of the centreline and there's no visible white join line at all, so it looks like, this factory at least, has got its act together. I did rub the line with some glue remover just in case, but I get the feeling it wasn't necessary:



The only small bit of touching up to do is on the bottom binding underneath the pocket, where the ends of the curved binding don't quite meet the strip under the pocket and one of the curved ends has a slight crack.



So I'll try repairing it with Tippex (a typewriter correction fluid), as that's a liquid white plastic solution that fills in gaps nicely.

[Adam Barnes]

Some nice red there simon