Waz's TL-1AR Spare Parts Swampy Caster

[wazkelly]

Great explaination of your Tru Oil Technique Waz. Just to be clear with the wet sanding...little circles,wipe off,little circles??

When applying the TO just a small couple of drops on the grit side up and then proceeded to wipe on with the grain mostly to avoid any cross grain scratches. As it started to feel dry, added a few drops, repeat again until fully covered. Some other techniques suggested swapping to a rag and buffing dry but that didn't work too well for me on an early coat application so went with a similar method to ragging where you make sure surface has been coated but not over saturated. As it dries fairly quickly another coat can be applied later that day. Mostly I will do a coat before heading off to work and a 2nd that night after dinner so in about 10-14 days you can have 20 coats done and with the 50/50 turps dilution it doesn't build up as thick as same amount full strength plus you have effectively wet sanded with each application too. After 4th coat using 1200 it felt smooth enough to finish there and then but glad I kept going as it now as smooth as glass.

[wazkelly]

Cool song & vid Deddy.

[wazkelly]

Setback......

Doing a bit more final polishing earlier tonight and accidentally bumped my workbench, and you guessed it, nice shiny body ends up on the garage floor, just like a buttered piece of toast, with the front taking the brunt of the fall. Unfortunately we have a textured coating on the concrete floor and that caused multiple acne like dents to about 30% of the surface. Luckily there was a lot of depth in the TO coats that allowed me to do a 1500 grit wet sand which removed most of the damage except for a few 'pin-prick' sized dents.

Just waiting for things to fully dry out and will need to hit it with a few full strength TO coats to help fill the craters and cover some of the thinner almost back to bare timber sections.

Thought I stood a good chance of finishing it off tomorrow before this rather inconvenient 'oops' moment. Didn't even think to take any photos as I was too mad at myself and just got stuck into sanding things back.

[Dedman]

I feel for ya Waz.

[wazkelly]

Thanks Deddy.

Only uttered a couple of rude words as there was no point getting angry as that just wastes time and energy.

[Simon Barden]

Having done a very similar thing, I feel for you. Even now, despite being as careful as possible, I still bump the bodies or put them down on screws or ball ends of strings that have somehow been drawn by some strange wooden magnetism effect into the wrong position.

[wazkelly]

Yeah, funny how when nearing the end of the finishing stage that lining up hardware for mock builds or marking holes to be drilled that all those pesky blemishes suddenly appear.

Basswood bodies are easily damaged as the wood is so soft as is Alder as I found out on this one too.

[Andy40]

Damn, I would have let a more than a few words fly Waz.

I suppose thats the great thing about Tru oil is that you can sand it back and get back on track! not too much drying time.

[wazkelly]

Yeah Andy,

It went something like oh $#!& then @%*! it.

Totally dumbfounded and here is the evidence......back undamaged

Nice and glassy with just a few touch ups happening around some of the rounded edges.

Here are some shots after the wet sanding session. Unfortunately some dings are quite deep and cannot afford to sand any more as it was already starting to hit bare timber and strip some of the chemical wash.

[wazkelly]

Extremities seemed to cop most of the fall...


Put on quite a thick TO coat about an hour ago and hope to put down at least one more later in the day. This has probably set me back another 10 - 14 days and the upside is there could have been lost more damage so I should be grateful for the minimal amount there was.