Today I spent time getting more acrylic lacquer onto the Ash Stratocaster. Yesterday I managed 5 coats - representing most of a full can of White Knight Clear Acrylic Gloss. Today I applied 2 more coats, flattened the surface somewhat with 800 grit paper, and then applied two more coats. Between coats, both yesterday and today, I have had the body in front of my IR lacquer curer (outdoor heater from Bunnings) and that has helped speed up the process brilliantly.
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| The lacquer is slowly building up a gloss finish. |
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| More uneven grain on the front means more rough places to take care of. |
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| The back is much more level then the front, and looking good! |
The result is a guitar body that is starting to level up, but is still a little rough in places where the ash grain is still showing through. In these places in particular, there area few "pinholes" that I will need to take care of with some carefully placed lacquer. That's a job for tomorrow before I flatten the surface again with 800 grit. Hopefully with a couple more coats she'll be ready for a final wet-sand with 1500 and then 2000 grits, followed by a polish with Meguiars compounds.
While the body has been curing I have also been able to slowly build up coats of Tru-Oil on the neck. Currently there are now 7 thin coats over the Vintage Amber dye, and she's starting to look nice and shiny.
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| 7 Coats of Tru-Oil on the Neck and She's Looking Good |
Not only does she look nice, she is really starting to feel nice too. I have been applying 0000 steel wool between coats, and between the 6th and 7th coat I gave the whole surface a light wet-sand with 1500 grit. A few more of those and she'll be ready for the decal.
Today I bit the bullet and ordered a set of
Stratocaster Gold Hardware from the good folks at
Pitbull Guitars. I'm hoping that the gold will put the finishing touch on this axe. I've never seen a blue axe that didn't look amazing with gold. Here's hoping!
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