I have been working on the finish of this Stratocaster copy for some time now. I wasn't happy with the first finish I applied which was also bright red so I sanded everything down and sprayed the body solid heritage cherry but I didn't like the colour! I always wanted a red 'Hank Marvin' like Strat so I started from scratch and resprayed the body red again.
There were a few pits and marks which needed spot filling with lacquer. I used nitrocellulose clear lacquer so I was able to carefully spot fill and then sand smooth after a couple of days knowing the lacquer would melt into itself leaving no trace of the blemishes.
Sanding down a guitar body by hand is not easy and I made things more difficult by starting off with 1200 grit sandpaper. I have sanded through the finish on previous bodies in seconds using courser grades of paper and knowing how thin I had applied the lacquer I did not want that to happen again.
I started with 1200 grit and then onto 1500 grit. All the areas I had drop filled with lacquer flattened out and blended seamlessly so I then went through 3 different grades or abrasive liquids applied using a hand held buffer. This certainly made the job much simpler and quicker. There was still some areas that the buffer couldn't reach which completed by hand.
Finally I buffed and polished to a lovely mirror finish and started assembling the hardware. It wasn't long before I had attached all the body components before attaching the neck and fitting the strings.
Everything tested fine and I am now a proud owner of my very first Strat. It's nothing like Hank Marvin's, for starters it has a rosewood fret board, an alder body, silver hardweware and a rather sparkly pick guard. But this time the finish is staying as it is... no more refinishes for some years please!
No comments:
Post a Comment