Ducklet's STF-1

[Ducklets]

So, went looking for paint ideas, and found some dark green glittery stuff. Bought that, some undercoat, and clear. Current plan is a dragon theme, with a head carving on the end of neck. I have some tung oil left over from my fiddle build. that will go on the neck and fingerboard.
Plan:
1 Test paint, how it interacts with the tung oil. How to get the best smooth finish over the textured glitter finish.
2. basic shaping of head. sanding
3. tung oil on neck, mask that.
4. base coat on body, head
5. Black paint in trem cavity of body, under pickguard.
6. masking. including pick-guard area. Anticipating moderately thick clear coat because of textured paint.
7. color paint.
8. clear coats to basic smooth finish
9. detail carving.
10. detail painting.
11. clear finish.
12. unmask.
13. shielding.
14. Assembly.
thinking of putting the decal on the pick-guard. will mean disassembly, and clear finish on the guard.

[Ducklets]

Received Kit quickly, it's nice. But I have a volume knob on one of the Tone pots. other than that, it seems great.

[wazkelly]

Welcome Ducklets.

Current price for that kit is extremely good value. Interesting plans and hope it all comes together just fine for you.

Cheers, Waz

[Andy40]

Welcome to the forum Ducklets. Any chance of a piccy of the kit?

[Ducklets]

Kit partial assembly


Controls. Two volume knobs. The middle knob is on a pot with a capacitor, so it definately is supposed to be a Tone knob


Test of oil. will finish this, then test Primer and paint over it.

[Ducklets]

On the Controls image, you can see the edge of the jack cutout thru the screw hole. I'll see if i can adjust the jack position, and do some undercut carving, to give the screw more purchase. Also, the tuner holes seem over-large, 10.3mm diameter, and the pegs are 9.6mm dia. they rattle around a bit.

[Ducklets]

Spent today madly doing Canadian thanksgiving... but finished rounding the fret ends, and started the test paints

[phrozin]

Controls. Two volume knobs. The middle knob is on a pot with a capacitor, so it definately is supposed to be a Tone knob

i just finished the same kit last week mine had 1 vol and 2 tone someone buggered up

By glitter sticking up, I mean it's almost like a non-slip finish, green glitter flakes in a clear medium. You definitely need a coloured undercoat, because even with 7 layers of glitter, you can see that undercoat when the light's not reflecting in your eyes. I want to get a lot of clear on top, or I'll be sanding the tips off those glitter flakes.

i was checking this stuff a week ago at bunnings i thought it was clear over base which you had to do a colour coat followed by glitter then clear but didn't think it would be very good on a guitar as the finish wouldn't look that great simply because of the type of paint it is, would be better to get 100gm pack of super flake and mix your own from DNA or spray chief be interested how this one will go

[Ducklets]

Hey Phrozin, nice builds. I'm pretty new to the whole spray paint thing, so I'm taking the "Easy Option" of store bought, haha. My test coats came up ok, crossing fingers. I like the end of the fingerboard on your candy apple strat, hadn't even thought of shaping that.

[Ducklets]

Undercut the jack cutout with my dremel. The wood separating the spring compartment from the bridge pickup is only about 3mm thick, and they've tried drilling a 12mm hole for the ground wire. Understandably, it's a mess. perhaps a 3-4mm hole would be more sensible?
Started sanding the body.