Guitar
A customer acquired Squier of indeterminate vintage, for free I believe, and decided they wanted to "spiff" it up without spending a lot. Since the Squier had the typical poly urethane/polyester bowling ball finish and it was a heavy plywood body, we agreed that I'd leave the original finish underneath a new dark blue metallic finish. I am also installing a Dimarzio Humbucker in place of the stock Squier bridge humbucker.
The first step was to disassemble the guitar and rough up the original black finish to give the new finish something to grip onto. I used a random orbital sander with a 100 grit pad for the front and back, and 220 grit wet and dry paper for the contours and edges. I then wet sanded the front and back with a block and 220 paper. This is what the body looked like after that:
I then sprayed the body with a good heavy coat of Camger flat white nitro primer - which not only gives a good surface for the color coat but also helps fill in small scratches in the under coat.
Once the primer dried a few hours, I wet sanded it to smooth out the body, with 320 grit wet and dry paper. This removed some of the primer coat but not enough to warrant a second primer coat, especially since the body looked quite good. For the color coat, I used a can of Duplicolor acrylic lacquer in "Dark Blue", which is a dark metallic blue. I first just lightly coated the edges and then the front and back - and set the body aside for 15 minutes to let the solvent flash off.
Then over the next half hour I built up heavier coats of color until I had complete coverage on all surfaces. This is the body drying after the initial color coat - looks pretty good already !!
Once this coat dries - I plan on wet sanding the body with 400 and 800 grit paper - and then applying one more color coat if there are any sand throughs. If there aren't, then I will move right to clear coats - I'll probably put at least 3 or 4 clear coats on, before a final wet sanding, compounding and buffing out.
UPDATE 3/13/07
Finally finished putting this strat together, with a Dimarzio pickup added at the bridge position. A few pics of the completed guitar.
- 1976 Fender Precision Bass: Refinish To Lake Placid Blue - A Classic 60s Color!
This is a fairly straight forward refinish of a stripped Fender Precision bass body in one of Fender's classic 1960s custom colors, Lake Placid Blue. As with all of the Fender custom colors of the 60s, Lake Placid Blue was originally a car color for...
- Musicmaster Disaster !! Another Daphne Blue Fender Bass
Here's an example of a rebuild project that honestly doesn't make a whole lot of sense in terms of "effort" vs. "value" - but what the hell. Its fulfilling to take an instrument someone has managed to destroy and bring it back to not only being...
- G&l L1000 Bass - Partial Refinish
Another project that has recently come my way - an early 80s G&L L-1000 bass with a mahogany body and a transparent brown or mocha finish - that has suffered from some sort of finish deterioration on the front face only. The pits in the finish actually...
- G&l Asat Bass Refinish
Ok some of you may wince, because this bass had a very nicely done factory cherry sunburst finish when I started on it, but the owner simply didn't like it and wanted something brighter and louder and more ... ORANGE !!! This is a very cool bass -...
- 1978 Fender Jazz Bass Refin Project
(originally published 12. October 2007) I just started a new project on behalf of a customer this past Wednesday - its a 1978 Fender Jazz bass thats been through a lot and had a partial refin over the years. The bass has replacement tuners and bridge...
Guitar
Squier Strat Quickie Paint Job
A customer acquired Squier of indeterminate vintage, for free I believe, and decided they wanted to "spiff" it up without spending a lot. Since the Squier had the typical poly urethane/polyester bowling ball finish and it was a heavy plywood body, we agreed that I'd leave the original finish underneath a new dark blue metallic finish. I am also installing a Dimarzio Humbucker in place of the stock Squier bridge humbucker.
The first step was to disassemble the guitar and rough up the original black finish to give the new finish something to grip onto. I used a random orbital sander with a 100 grit pad for the front and back, and 220 grit wet and dry paper for the contours and edges. I then wet sanded the front and back with a block and 220 paper. This is what the body looked like after that:
I then sprayed the body with a good heavy coat of Camger flat white nitro primer - which not only gives a good surface for the color coat but also helps fill in small scratches in the under coat.
Once the primer dried a few hours, I wet sanded it to smooth out the body, with 320 grit wet and dry paper. This removed some of the primer coat but not enough to warrant a second primer coat, especially since the body looked quite good. For the color coat, I used a can of Duplicolor acrylic lacquer in "Dark Blue", which is a dark metallic blue. I first just lightly coated the edges and then the front and back - and set the body aside for 15 minutes to let the solvent flash off.
Then over the next half hour I built up heavier coats of color until I had complete coverage on all surfaces. This is the body drying after the initial color coat - looks pretty good already !!
Once this coat dries - I plan on wet sanding the body with 400 and 800 grit paper - and then applying one more color coat if there are any sand throughs. If there aren't, then I will move right to clear coats - I'll probably put at least 3 or 4 clear coats on, before a final wet sanding, compounding and buffing out.
UPDATE 3/13/07
Finally finished putting this strat together, with a Dimarzio pickup added at the bridge position. A few pics of the completed guitar.
- 1976 Fender Precision Bass: Refinish To Lake Placid Blue - A Classic 60s Color!
This is a fairly straight forward refinish of a stripped Fender Precision bass body in one of Fender's classic 1960s custom colors, Lake Placid Blue. As with all of the Fender custom colors of the 60s, Lake Placid Blue was originally a car color for...
- Musicmaster Disaster !! Another Daphne Blue Fender Bass
Here's an example of a rebuild project that honestly doesn't make a whole lot of sense in terms of "effort" vs. "value" - but what the hell. Its fulfilling to take an instrument someone has managed to destroy and bring it back to not only being...
- G&l L1000 Bass - Partial Refinish
Another project that has recently come my way - an early 80s G&L L-1000 bass with a mahogany body and a transparent brown or mocha finish - that has suffered from some sort of finish deterioration on the front face only. The pits in the finish actually...
- G&l Asat Bass Refinish
Ok some of you may wince, because this bass had a very nicely done factory cherry sunburst finish when I started on it, but the owner simply didn't like it and wanted something brighter and louder and more ... ORANGE !!! This is a very cool bass -...
- 1978 Fender Jazz Bass Refin Project
(originally published 12. October 2007) I just started a new project on behalf of a customer this past Wednesday - its a 1978 Fender Jazz bass thats been through a lot and had a partial refin over the years. The bass has replacement tuners and bridge...