Dual builds 2020

Well, I know I'm already sick of all the Coronavirus motivated projects that every man and his dog are posting on every form social media, BUT...

this is my contribution to the done-to-death 2020 CV19 list of things-to-do:

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Build #1 is an LP-ish kind of thing. Mahogany body, mahogany neck, rosewood fb (24.75" scale).
It will be Red Candy Pearl with a clear coat (ac lac). The neck is already finished with satin poly. There will be a slight departure from the norm as it will feature 2 single coils with a Twisted Tele neck pickup and a Texas Special bridge pickup. Standard 1V,1T, 3-way toggle.

Build #2 is a strat but also with some small deviations. Alder body with maple/maple neck (also finished in satin poly). Rounded plate-less neck join recessed bushings). I'll put in a set of Tonerider Classic Blues but with 7-way switching and Leo Fender's PTB circuit (Passive Treble Bass).

The finish on this one is where I'm getting a little experimental (at least for me).
I'll do a base coat of metallic silver and apply a trans-blue "clear coat". It's my first time tinting a clear lacquer, so we'll see how it goes. I have heaps of clear to spray test pieces beforehand.

This sound like true hot rod colors. Will be anxious to see how they turn out!

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Sweet! Is that LP an epi that you are re-birthing?

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Sweet! Is that LP an epi that you are re-birthing?

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Yes, it is. (was?) One of the bottom tier LP Special II's.
I guess calling it a build may be a bit of a stretch, but at one point I did have it down to bare guitar-shaped pieces of timber and that includes re-shaping the body (adding contours). So that's all that remains of the original.

A little progress with the singlecut body yesterday.

Base coat and clear coats on. I'm still learning the technique of gun spraying, so I did get some orange peel.
However, it's still less than I ever got with rattle cans and completely workable.

I'll let this one sit for 14 days before moving on to sand & polish.
In the mean time, I'll do some testing with the tinted clear for the strat and hopefully get base & clear on that soon.

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Also, my new touch-up gun is coming today, so I'll spend some time with that.
My plan is to replace the airbrush with the mini spray gun. The mini gun has a .5mm nozzle like my airbrush, which is great for getting nice thin coats but provides a wider fan. Should be more efficient and effective for doing necks.

Alright for some, I'm locked down 40 miles from my project...

Loving the candy red!

Ooooh, sorry to hear of your plight Jim!

I do count my blessings that I have a good-sized shed in my back yard, and that we're not in official lockdown here in AUS (yet).

Also, thanks Glen!

All good work going on here mate. Watching with interest. Looking great

Nice! That is a real hot rod color.

A bit of progress today. This time on the strat.

Got my metallic silver base coat and two coats of clear on. (that's the "clear" clear)
Next is to start the trans blue coats. I'm still playing with tint ratios, but I think I'm close.

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I'm giving the LP (behind the strat) another 5 days, then I'll start cutting back and polishing.
I've done something on, or related to, one of these nearly every day since I started this thread (17 days ago) but it sure doesn't look like much progress. Some of that time has been experimenting, testing and some minor shop improvements though.

Still a way to go with neck stuff, but once that's done, it will just be assembly and set-up. I already have all the hardware and electronics for both!

More forward movement... albeit slowly.

I got the final coats of trans-blue on today, following a gun malfunction on the weekend and subsequent levelling.

The end result isn't what I saw in my head originally, but as far as an experimental process for me, I'll call it a success.
I pictured a deeper blue. I learnt the depth of colour in the cup does not equally reflect the atomised paint layer going down.

Despite all my test mixing and spraying, I now think I should have gone even heavier on the dye in the clear. This is even after doubling my test mix ratio. Oh well, live & learn.
I still can't seem to get perfectly smooth coat yet, so do have a bit of orange peel to level out once cured, but completely manageable.
It will polish up just fine.
Between having to re-spray and build up coats to get the depth of colour, there is a sh**-tonne lacquer on there. No fear of sand-through on this one!

The photo doesn't show it, the blue tinted clear over the silver metallic actually creates a bit of a pearlescence that I wasn't totally expecting. Once I have it levelled and polished, I'll take some close up photos that will hopefully come through better.

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Looking tidy! And sweet decal on the LP headstock too mate.

Wow that's a great blue!

Getting a perfectly smooth coat out of the gun is incredibly difficult with lacquer. The right thinning and spray conditions (ie booth with extractor fan and temp control) go a long way, but even then you need to do a pretty heavy cutting compound pass before polishing. The best way is to use 2 pack, but you really need a good p2 mask and to be set up for it. Great off the gun results though.

I'm resigned to just cutting back and polishing after using rattle cans at the moment. After spending a lot of my childhood and teenage years prepping and painting cars, a guitar is such a nice step down in terms of area to cover.

Agreed, that is a fantastically rich blue. I love it!

Thanks guys!

@ Sonic, yeah my conditions are not ideal as I'm essentially spraying outdoors. I'm fortunate that I at least have a good size shed that I set up "spray tent" just out of the roller door. It helps as a wind-break and keeps the over-spray out of the shed (mostly).
My biggest problem lack of experience. I only do 2-3 guitars a year so there's long breaks between paint sessions, and it get expensive just blowing paint to practice.

My motivation for switching to a gun from cans is not being limited by available colours. Plus I haven't had any of the adhesion problems I sometimes encountered with rattle cans.
Despite my imperfect finish with the gun, then end results have been significantly better too. I still go into it knowing there will be cutting & polishing, but overall happier with it.

I have thought about trying one of the new "green" 2-pack products that have come out, but need more research.

Cheers

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And sweet decal on the LP headstock too mate.

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That's not a decal... that's an inlay! (wink-wink)

OK... finally back moving on these builds...

Wet sand & polish on the LP-ish thing. Got a bit of sanding/polishing on the neck to do, then I'll begin assembly.

These two are definitely the slowest builds I've ever done. Not that they've been difficult, just other stuff popping up and a series of motivational slumps :o
At least it's smooth & shiny now!

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Originally Posted by McCreed

OK... finally back moving on these builds...

Wet sand & polish on the LP-ish thing. Got a bit of sanding/polishing on the neck to do, then I'll begin assembly.

These two are definitely the slowest builds I've ever done. Not that they've been difficult, just other stuff popping up and a series of motivational slumps :o
At least it's smooth & shiny now!

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Looking good. What's the eletronics plan?

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Looking good. What's the eletronics plan?

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Thanks BD!
It will be a little different in that it will have Fender single coils in it!

A Custom Shop Twisted Tele neck pickup and a Custom Shop Texas Special in the bridge.
Standard 3-way switching: N/NB/B with master volume, master tone.

I suspect this might a naturally bright instrument, so I'm considering going with 100 or 150k pots.
I'll have to try it and see where it wants to go. I'm leaning towards calling it a Les Tele, but maybe a Tele Paul...

Ooooo nice, hits us from left field. You going to use conversion rings??

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Originally Posted by Bakersdozen

Ooooo nice, hits us from left field. You going to use conversion rings??

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Yeah, I've custom-made ones with black 3-ply pickguard material. (B/W/B)

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Yeah, I've custom-made ones with black 3-ply pickguard material. (B/W/B)

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Yeah you do!

Really nice work McCreed, loving that twisted LPish body!

Thanks Frankie.
I went pretty hard sanding the edges and gave it the forearm contour as well as a bit of belly cut on the back.

Got to work on cutting & polishing the neck yesterday. Hope to get shielding & electronics done on the weekend.

Sooooo schinie!!!

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Originally Posted by Andy40

Sooooo schinie!!!

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I hit it with some Meguiar's Scratch X 2.0 yesterday and it's even shinier now!

I've never used it before but I ask around here, and the Scratch X was recommended.
I tried it on both acrylic lacquer and poly, but don't know how it would go on nitro, as it is a petroleum based product.
I don't use nitro though anyway.

Should be fine on nitro. I use naptha on nitro for cleaning, and that's another petroleum-style product. I've just bought some X 2.0 to try out and had what looked like a perfect nitro spray job on a body not developed two weird bubbles in the finish whilst curing for the past two weeks, I could have told you just how well it works compared to some other polishing compounds I have. Instead, I'm having to redo those areas (and the bits of sunburst I then sanded through whilst fixing the bubble holes) and re-clear coat.

Bummer Simon. Sand-throughs suck :mad:

It was the bubbles that sucked more. If not for them, I wouldn't have needed to sand. At least the sand-throughs were on the black outer-edge of the sunburst, so are relatively easy to respray and fix.

It's just that I spend all my time fixing stuff, and not progressing.

I hear you on that one!

Progress had stalled a bit (again).
Managed to get the cavity shielding done today. No pix. Nothing all that exciting. Mostly posting this as a motivator for myself!

Because I'm installing single coils into HB routes, I'll be using modified HB mounting rings plus conversion plates that I custom made.
So this will require some creative shielding to achieve continuity. The back of the conversion plates will get a layer of copper tape (think of them as individual mini pickguards) then the cavity shielding extended through the mounting ring.
It may sound convoluted, but I've done it before and have a method that works.

I'll also connect the 3 cavities (p/u x 2 + control) with hook-up wire.

Well I got the Les-Tele finished off today.
Still have some minor tweaking to do (mainly fine tuning the intonation) but it set up very quickly with no issues so far.
Plays very nicely and sounds great too.

I love the CS Twisted Tele neck pickup and it pairs well with the CS Texas Special in the bridge.
I was worried that this guitar might sound too bright with such a light mahogany body (the whole guitar weights in at 3.22kg) and single coils, but it has not been the case. I'll get better feel for it once I can crank it up tomorrow when Mrs. McCreed is out!

I had a couple of firsts on this one, and of course learnt a lot.
I wasn't necessarily a true build as much as it was a total do-over, but I'm pretty happy with it.

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Glad it all worked out for you mate. Looks tidy AF!

Very tidy. Wouldn't mind seeing a pic front on, as well as a profile. No demands here, I'm just keen to take it all in.

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I love the red and the finish looks awesome. But the whole guitar is causing some dissonance in my brain. The more I look, the more it switches between tele and LP. My brain struggles to classify this, much like this optical illusion. So on that score, your Les-Tele is working very nicely indeed!

Love the hot rod color. This looks just killer

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Build #2 of 2020 (strat) has gone backwards. I'll go so far as to epic fail :mad:

I finally began wet sanding this yesterday and only got through the 600 & 1200 when I got some thin spots appearing in the tinted clear. At first I thought it would be ok as the two main spots would be under the bridge and the pickguard and were quite small anyway. As I continued, I had a bit show up at one of the cutaways.

Now, just as a refresher for you... I did this with a metallic silver acrylic lacquer base coat (over primer) then a few coats of clear over the silver, followed by 4 coats of "blue clear" (clear acrylic lacquer tinted blue).

The result was promising for the kind of effect I was going for, but I obviously didn't get the blue clear as even as I had thought. With that wonderful thing we call hindsight, if I had done some coats of clear clear over the blue clear (got that?) I probably would have been sweet.

So after the initial disappointment, I thought maybe I can make lemonade out of these lemons.
I started intentionally sanding through the blue clear down to the clear on top of the metallic silver. I went around the perimeter where the edges start to roll over thinking I could create a pleasing effect sort of like a reverse burst.
The key word in that sentence is "thinking" however I should add "wishful".

The more I worked it, the more looked like a dog's breakfast. It was just horrible and stupid looking.

Trying to stay positive, I've taken the opportunity curve the neck pocket more than I had when I originally shaped the body. I will just re-prime and re-spray the whole thing. Fortunately we've got some warm days ahead in S.E. QLD, so should at least get the priming done.

I'll probably go with a solid metallic base coat, possibly something like a sapphire blue.
This may also involve some more experimentation by alternating colour coat/clear coat/colour coat etc.
I have read that a real depth of the metallic flake can be achieved this way.
I now have two guns so I could go back & forth between colour & clear easily within one painting session.

However I could just as easily be setting myself up to fail again. I guess there's always a plain solid colour if plan B goes pear-shaped too.

Don’t ya just love sanding? 🤪

It's what brings us together!
I feel your pain McCreed.