"I can't believe it's not lacquer" is staying sticky

[ThatCluelessGerman]

No diamonds here, my wedding band is stainless steel. More the practical type of person I guess ;-)

[ThatCluelessGerman]

Surprise! The Solarez stuff is starting to peel during the final sanding and polishing process!

Now, I don't know what to do. It seems to separate between the coats. I'm torn between sanding it down with 600 grid and risk taking too much off and adding another coat now whatever it is, I can't leave it like that...

Help....

[Simon Barden]

I think you'll have to contact Solarez directly and ask them.

[RocknRolf]

Would you be able to add a picture? I work with epoxy daily, hope I can help you out.

How has it cured by now? Getting harder?

[ThatCluelessGerman]

It's difficult to see, but I circled some areas where bits were coming off. The cloudy pattern is not the problem, that is going through the different layers I guess. But right in between, there are some spots that became little holes, like the layers started to separate.

As it's UV lacquer, I had it sit under UV lights a few hours and then outside on my balcony for like a half day. It was very hard to the touch and it sanded really well initially. It gone awry when I started to wet sand it. On a side note, now that everything is dry again, it sands very well again. It seems to react with broken bits when wet sanding.



I'm not really sure what to do now, most probably adding another coat as best as I can and calling it done I guess.

The top is looking really freaking ugly anyway... I hoped to get a bright magenta top with black tiger stripes, but the veneer doesn't have much striping and the magenta turned out red. I don't like red. So.... pretty close to ordering a few rattle cans and paint it black ;-)

[Rabbit]

The top is looking really freaking ugly anyway... I hoped to get a bright magenta top with black tiger stripes, but the veneer doesn't have much striping and the magenta turned out red. I don't like red. So.... pretty close to ordering a few rattle cans and paint it black ;-)

Take it back to the bottom layer of resin, then spray a silver flake base, then a deep red candy. The more coats of a true candy, the deeper and darker the red gets. Then finish with 2k clear .

[ThatCluelessGerman]

Funny idea

As I don't have any real dedicated place to spray, doing glitter in the house would most probably result in a divorce

But, do you think - if I sand it down to the bottom layer - anything else would stick? Like 2k clear or epoxy resin?
Just for a test on a piece of scrap wood, I tried to add polyurethane varnish over the Solarez and it didn't really stick. You could peel if off after it dried. So I'm not sure if there is anything that would stick at all.

[RocknRolf]

Agree with Rabbit, you want to get back to the layer below.

With what grit sand paper did you finish before applying this layer? If you finish with to high of a grit(600) you are not getting the mechanical bond you want.

Epoxy layers are best build up with the previous layer still curing to get a chemical and mechanical bond.

[Simon Barden]

I can't remember but did you sand after every coat?

For the spray-on, the instructions say the first light coat is directly followed by a thicker coat, but that should then be sanded and the three subsequent thick coats should always be sanded. Because it's fully cured by the UV, the surface will be pretty flat overall and there's not a lot for the coat on top to grip on to. So you need to sand so there's a rough surface that the next coat can stick to.

If you've done that, then I've no idea why the layers are peeling.

But any other coating would need a sanded surface to have any hope of adhering to.

[ThatCluelessGerman]

Yes, I sanded in between each coat. I used P600 sand in between. After that, I wiped with Isopropyl and after it was dry, I put on the next coat.

I didn't know P600 is too high.... I saw some dude on YT doing the same and it worked for him... Dang. The stuff sands really well, so I wasn't concerned about adhesion at all.

I always sand in between coats, mainly because it is just impossible to get it dust and crud free, and there will ALWAYS be the odd dog hair that just sits on the fresh coat. So no matter if it's poly or lacquer, I can't get away without sanding in between anyway, or I will have some nice little fur pieces embedded in between

This week is going to be rainy and cloudy, so if I decide to try topping it off after sanding it down, I need to wait until next Monday anyway. Currently, I'm thinking my next guitar is going to get either some epoxy top coat or maybe superglue. The UV lacquer sounded good but isn't working for me, the polyurethane is yellowing too much and spraying lacquer is not doable for me here.