And yes, great point! I'll definitely hit up the cavities with a bit of poly on the last two coats to ensure they're sealed.
Somewhere in the early 20's I tried a pour on the top rather than bottle -> rag -> guitar, and managed to get some to run into the control cavity, so the bottom of that is fairly sealed already. Should be able to get shielding paint over the top though.
Last edited by ross.pearson; 22-08-2021 at 06:06 PM.
I put down the final coat of wipe on poly for the body. It's gonna need some finessing to get it to look okay after it cures, but I'm pretty happy for a first attempt. Hopefully no sanding through the clear coat...
Made some progress on the neck/headstock. Maybe some fiddly work and fine details to complete, but not sure if there's much value to add. In the end it will be what it will be. Headstock is painted up now, I went for a full matte black in the scallop, it should look pretty good with finish on it. I still want to scrape/clean off the inlay to brighten it up a bit.
And some different angles of the scallop.
I taped off the fretboard as I'll keep that the original blonde maple colour. I'm planning a spray can oil poly finish, that may add a slight tint but most likely not a lot. I gave the neck the same "rubbed back" black treatment as I did with the body. I want to tie things together and I think a fully blonde maple neck on the body would seem a bit jarring.
I realise some of you are screaming right now.
Off to buy an IKEA portable wardrobe tent on the drive home tonight, so I can set it up as a "spray booth" for the neck finish.
Cabothane... how many coats for a neck?
Last edited by ross.pearson; 23-08-2021 at 01:16 PM.
Neck colour looks fine to me. Not even a slight wince here.
The maple is smoother and less absorbent than the body wood, so less sanding is required to get it flat, but I’d still put 4-6 coats on depending on the coat thickness, probably 6, especially as the neck has been stained. Any sand-through will leave a lighter patch which will be hard to fix in isolation, so it’s either sanding the whole neck down (I did that twice on the Hexacaster) and starting again, or touching up the clear coat and leaving the lighter patch.
With the Cabot's, I'd do 3 coats 10mins apart. Leave it a few days, very light sand then another 3 coats 10 mins apart. Then leave as long as you can before evaluating next move.
Thanks for not wincing! You'd make an excellent poker player.Originally Posted by Simon Barden
I actually found this paint practically slid off the Tasmanian Oak body, to the point I had difficulty with consistent coverage because any additional paint would lubricate and reveal bare wood that refused to take paint again. With the maple I had to get aggressive with methylated spirits to rub the paint back after a few seconds of air drying.
I was thinking 6 coats minimum, but after all the work layering poly on the body it seems insane that only 6 coats of anything will work well. I guess that's the deal with spraying instead of wiping. I think I'll be happier to do more work on wet sanding a clear if it saves me weeks of hand application.
Back of the can says 6 hours between coats, but I'm gonna assume you've got a load of experience here and know what you're doing. I certainly like the idea of completing the application in two short sessions rather than dragging it out.
Sorry Ross, the old instructions used to be do one coat, leave 10 mins and then repeat twice. So it's a total of 3 coats in half an hour. Then leave for a few days. So I like to think of it as a session = 3 coats over 30 mins. Don't go too thick in each coat to avoid runs. You'll get the hang of it. There are a few in depth posts about the Cabot's schedule if you have a search around here.
Fantastic, thanks for that. I'll likely follow the instructions you've laid out here, sounds like it will work well. Cheers!
Blue tape off and a quick touchup and cleanup, small amount of sanding. I think I like the contrast?
I made a quick spinning hook setup from a broken satchel strap hook and some fence wire. The wire is bent in such a way that it "snaps" over the rail in the IKEA "booth". The strap hook swivels, allowing the piece to be easily spun around.
I set up the IKEA spray booth, dog for scale.
Annoyingly, my spray can of cabothane might have been dodgy. I've never used it before so I don't know. There was a red... mister? ...supressor? on the nozzle. I got exactly one nice light spray out of it before it absolutely refused to work again. It's a 1.5 hour round trip to the closest big green shed, so I wanted to make this work. I tried adjusting the little red guy to see if it was acting as some kind of switch, and of course it shot off the nozzle and out into the yard, never to be seen again.
Good news, the spray works. Bad news, it WORKS. I'm worried it's gone down way too thick. There's nothing that can't be fixed, but I'm starting to run out of time for this project.
Was it a rectangular shape? If so it was probably a rotating nozzle, designed to give a fan-pattern rather then a circular cone pattern from a standard can. It rotates (I use pliers) to give a horizontal or vertical fan spray. Fan direction is at 90° to the main axis of the rectangle. So horizontal rectangle = vertical fan spray.
It probably just needed a pin to unclog the nozzle. (This is why they say to turn it upside down after use and press to use the propellant to blow any residue from the nozzle).
If you think there's too much on, then wait a day before spraying some more to give it extra time to dry.
You can always try using a nozzle from another spray can (use on cardboard first to avoid any old paint being transferred to the neck).
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