Well, I'm back to finishing this lovely little beast. After some major arm surgery and a long lay off the tools while i regained the use of my arm, i went and bought myself a Pitbull kit to play with. But having this project started and being less than pleased with the results I figured i should keep going with this one and learn a few more things first.
In keeping with the spirit of sharing the good the bad and the ugly, I reckon i have made almost every mistake in surface prep so far. Sanding the maple veneer initially was a major mistake. I've put scratches in the surface that i thought i'd dealt with, but the stain sure did highlight them. And then there's the scratches in the side that I can't for the life of me work out how I missed. I can only assume i have knocked it at some point while on the bench and not realised. Grrrrr.
So today it was decision time. It's either firewood, or I have a shot at finishing it and accept that the first attempt was probably never going to be perfect anyway. I've given it a few coats of sanding sealer and I'll block it down tomorrow. Ive already had three goes at the head stock. Stain looked awful, paint soaked into the wood and looked dreadful. so i sealed it, under coated it, then painted it black. and it looked like shit on a stick. SO i tripped it back and did it again. There's a few imperfections but I'm beginning to think I've found the limitations of a workshop built to work on bikes, not guitars. It's a bit cool this time of year. Its a touch dusty at times. All things i can address moving forward. Learning learning learning.