Thinline Cabronita: Wired and Making Noise!

Well, she's finally finished - the Ash Surf-abilly Thinline Cabronita. I'm very, very happy with the final results - much better than I ever imagined that they would be. The seafoam green flames over the Bali green base work really nicely, and give a nod to the rockabilly set. All that chrome hardware from GFS also works nicely too, as does the retro Cabronita pickguard.

The seafoam and Bali greens are very difficult to photograph. Depending on the light, the photo you end up with is either a washed out olive green, or a light blue like the photos below. You'll just have to take my word for it - this baby looks seafoam in the flesh. That is to say, really bloody awesome!

As usual, the acrylic clear coats came up beautifully. The White King spray cans of gloss acrylic really are the easiest way to get a beautiful gloss finish on your axe - I cannot recommend them highly enough.

While the Thinline retains the classic lines of the Telecaster, the semi-hollow body removes most of the weight, resulting in a guitar that is very easy to handle. The body resonates really nicely too and you can almost play it like a hollow body (almost). Certainly there's a deal more noise coming from the guitar than a straight solid body Ash Telecaster.

All in all, I'd have to say that the Thinline Cabronita is very nearly the perfect guitar. Doing away with the control plate, it's got super-cool looks, it feels nice and light in the hands while remaining balanced on the strap, and it sounds really great unplugged. And with a couple of GFS Mean 90s on board, the package is even better!

These pickups sound really nice in clean mode - delivering just enough single coil twang for surf and rockabilly riffs. When you crank up the distortion, the pickups meet the challenge head on and really live up to their "mean" moniker. These babies rocks as hard as the best of them! So too, the xTrem tremolo from GFS is a really nice addition. It has a nice fluid feel, and combined with the roller bridge and roller string trees, doesn't seem to create any tuning stability problems. All in all a great little package that I'm having a hard time putting down!

Cabronita Thinline: Clear Coats & Assembly

After a few sessions baking under the IR lamp, the chemical smell has finally gone from the White King Acrylic clear coats and my Surf-abilly Thinline Cabronita is finally ready for its final cut and polish! As usual I started the process with a good wet-sand with 1500 grit, wet and dry paper. It took a while, but finally all the orange peel was removed and the surface was nice and matte with no shiny low spots. With this complete, I moved up to 2000 grit. After all the effort required to level all the orange peel with 1500, the 2000 took no time at all and the surface really started to take on a shine.

With the wet-sanding completed down to 2000 grit, it was time to cut and polish with Meguiars Ultimate Compound. This is when the shine really starts to deepen! After two passes with the compound - rubbing it in with small circular motions and then wiping it off - the surface looked amazing. There's no visible height transition between the flames and the background colour (the surface is completely flat) and the shine is awesome.

First pass with Meguiars Ultimate Compound.

With the polishing complete it was time for the long awaited assembly. The pre-drilled screw holes made it a snap to re-attach the neck and get the bridge and tremolo locked down without marring the finish at all.The pickups required a bit of finagling to get them lined up and screw holes drilled, but it was finally managed.

Hardware went back on like a dream.

Neck is still straight, with the strings running nicely from the tremolo,
over the bridge to the nut.

All that is left for me to do now to get the body finished is to cut a new pick guard out of plain white 3-ply material (the kit came with black) and to finish the wiring using shielded wire. Even with the bridge flat on the deck the strings are a good 5mm away from the 22nd fret, so the neck will need a shim before I do a fret level and complete the other setup tasks. First though - get this bad boy making noise! Can't wait to hear these GFS Mean 90s in action.

Cabronita Thinline: Hot Rod Flames

OK, it's decided - subtle hot rod flames it is for the Thinline Cabronita. Here's how I go about adding simple flames to a paint job. Caveat: please remember that I am an amateur who knows very little about the art of spray painting, airbrushes or anything of the like. This is a very simple approach that I have found that I can handle with my limited skills and the tools at my disposal!

Enough of the caveat, let's get to it! The first step it to take my design and transfer it on to a sheet of artists frisket. I have found that it's a good idea to trace it as thin as possible to avoid any errors during cutting.

Tracing my original flames design onto a piece of artists frisket

The next step is to cut out the design using a combination of scissors and a craft blade. This is the toughest part of the process and it can be very hard at times to create a nice smooth line. There are many places on this effort where my blade work was not up to snuff, but we can only do out best!

Cutting around the outline to leave the flames only.

Once the design is cut out, the backing is removed and the design is stuck down to the surface. There's not much danger of the frisket removing the original paint as it's usually very low tack (sometimes too low tack!).

The front design is peeled away from the backing and stuck down.

The back design is exactly the same as the front.

Once the frisket is stuck down on all 4 sides, any remaining areas are masked off with painters tape and butcher's paper. Be careful not to stick the tape to the original paint (it usually isn't low tack!) and also make sure you don't miss a spot! Taking the masking off only to reveal a spot of paint you didn't intend is a real prick let me tell you!

Additional areas are masked with butchers paper and painters tape.

With the additional masking complete, the new colour can be put down. This colour will become the new background colour - leaving the existing colour for the flames. I find that 2 coats should be more than enough to get even colour coverage but not create a large height difference between flame and background.

For my new background colour, I'm using MTN94 Bali Green. It's the next grade in the turquoise (seafoam green?) colour chart. I think it looks pretty good and will provide a subtle contrast to the MTN94 Luminous Green used for the flames.

The flame colour (left) is the original MTN94 Luminous Green.
The body colour (right) will be MTN94 Bali Green.

And so, after two coats of Bali Green the masking was ready to come off. I'm pretty happy with the results! The actual colour isn't quite as blue as it appears here. I managed to get all the frisket off without tearing the new paint. Gently does it!!

The front and under-edge with the frisket removed.

The back and top-edge with the frisket removed.

The body is now hanging in my bathroom under the IR lamp, getting ready for Acrylic clear coats. I can't wait to see this baby all assembled. Once the paint is cured I might do a sneak peak assembly to see how she is looking!

Postscript 08/04/2015:
Got the hardware on to the body for a quick peek - I just couldn't help myself!

A sneak peak with the chrome hardware. Looking great!

 

Cabronita Thinline: Hot Rod Flames?

I've been looking hard at the Thinline Cabronita build over the last few days with its large expense of seafoam green and only a very small pickguard.

That's a lot of green maybe?

Of course there's lashings of chrome to go on there too, but maybe, just maybe, there's a little too much seafoam. My Surf Monster Telecaster, which I absolutely love, used exactly the same shade of MTN94 paint, but nearly half is covered in pickguard! I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that this Cabronita might need something else.

So the question is what? I've been browsing the interwebs looking at racing stripes and other simple paint modifications, but nothing in that area seems to speak to me. Really, given the decided rockabilly-surf-crossover vibe of this build, wouldn't hot rod flames be the go? If you're not a fan of the rockabilly scene and the style it brings, then maybe flames might seem a bit tacky, but I kinda have a soft spot for them. To be honest, I think they worked really well on my son's BC Rich Avenge build - even if I do say so myself. Maybe I could give them another go?

Here's my first go at a concept for the paint job. I've sketched around the pickguard, but have ignored the placement of pickups, bridge and tremolo.

Hot Rod flames concept art ready for frisket if the mood takes me.

In terms of colour, I'm not thinking of anything nearly as drastic as with the Avenge paint job. I was thinking that this time around I could do a a very subtle flame made up of the current body colour, with a background colour only one shade darker.

Here's some colour quickly splashed over my concept art using photoshop. Of course the black edges around the flames would not be there in the final paint job. What do you think?

White or black pickguard? Black looks good with the outlines flames but..

I'm liking the idea, but I'm still not sold. I'm going to ruminate on this for a few days and see how I'm feeling after that.. I've got some MTN94 Bali Green in the post, so maybe a test or two with that will make my mind up for me.

Thinline Cabronita: Colour Coats

With the Ash Stratocaster still on the bench awaiting a bone nut blank, I had a chance to get back to the Thinline Cabronita which has been languishing with a single coat of primer for the last week or so.

After a very light wet sand with 800 grit wet/dry paper, I gave the body 2 more coats of primer and hung it overnight. Man, that body looked and felt pretty nice I can tell you! I could have stopped at matt white for this build without any qualms at all.

Wet sanding with 800 grit and a last coats of primer

With the primer dry I gave these last coats another light wet sand and then it was time for the colour coats. Just like I did for my Surf Monster Telecaster build, I have decided to go seafoam green for this Cabronita. That means getting the cans of MTN94 Luminous Green back out of the cupboard. I gotta say I really do love this colour, and it was a pleasure to be spraying it again!

The first coats of MTN94 RV6027 - Luminous Green

As usual, the MTN94 didn't disappoint. The first coat I laid down was a mist coat with much of the primer showing through. After drying for an hour in front of the IR lamp, I was able to lay down a second, more substantial coat. The results (shown above) are pretty damn pleasing I must say. That green just pops, and will look even better with some clear and a white pickguard :).

Anyway, the body went back under the IR lamp for the rest of the afternoon. I'm gonna let these coats lie for a couple of days now to make sure they are completely dry. I don't want any problems when the clear coats go on! One more coat of colour and I'll be able to lightly wet sand some of the orange peel away, then a final coat before moving to clear! That will be in a couple of days time. Hopefully!!

James' Les Paul Jnr: More Butterscotch Wudtone, Custom Pickguard

James' Les Paul Jnr Double Cut is continuing very nicely indeed. Today I got the second coat of Butterscotch Wudtone on the body and the fifth coat on the neck and headstock. The photos look a little darker than they do in real life, but I do believe that the neck colour may have finally caught up to the body! There certainly isn't much in it. I reckon she's looking awesome! Not sure any more colour is needed - what do you think James?

I also got the scroll saw out and shaped a new pickguard and truss-rod cover from 3-ply tortoiseshell pickguard material. They both came out very nicely indeed.

I am a little concerned that there is little to no clearance between the fretboard and the guitar body itself. The 3-ply tortoiseshell material is a little thicker than the original single-ply pickguard that came with the kit, and this might mean that the new pickguard has to sit flush with the end of the fretboard rather than under it. I guess we'll have to suck it and see at this stage.

I think this time around, rather than add more screws to cinch the pickguard down onto the curved body, I might try heating the pickguard material up in the oven and then bending it to conform to the body shape. I've never tried this before, so maybe a little experiment is in order!

Surf Monster Telecaster: Colour Coats Take #4

Well, yet another clear coat fail on the Surf Monster Telecaster. That makes 3 attempts so far, although the blue dye job can't really be classed as a "fail". The first coat of acrylic clear onto the Linz Iceberg didn't crack this time, but it did discolour the paint. Damn you to a fiery hell! The verdict on these Ironlak spray paints? They are total fucking shite! Don't use them, don't buy them, don't even mention them in polite conversation. You will be dissapointed - that's an Ironlak guarantee.

And so, it was with a heavy heart and aching arms that I yet again sanded back the basswood telecaster body, applied primer and was ready for colour. On the back of a comment from Sydney luthier Harry Aznavoorian, I decided to give the Montana Colors MTN94 range a try. Given that Harry has had similar problems with the Ironlak (Linz Iceberg too as it turns out!), and has reported good success with the MTN94, the choice was a no-brainer in the end. Thanks Harry!

And so, 2 cans of Montana's finest arrived on my doorstep this morning. I ordered the same colour as Harry (he too is doing a "Seafoam Green" build) - the MTN94 "R-6027: Luminouse Green". The colour looked great on the top of the can, so there was nothing for it but to get the colour on to the body and see how it looked!

The spray cans are advertised as low pressure - and they certainly are. The paint comes out nice and easy and there are no volume issues to worry about. I'll need to do several coats (probably 3 coats at current reckoning) but that's better than the paint going on too thick like that Ironlak shit did.The paint is matt, and actually looks really nice sitting on the body!

All in all I think the new colour looks really great - closer in fact to the original colour that I envisaged for this build. It isn't "Teal" like the Ironlak turned out to be, and it's much closer to the traditional "Seafoam" colour of the 50s and 60s Strats and Teles. Another couple of coats and everything will be great. The photo, unfortunately, does not do the colour justice - these blue/green hues are notoriously difficult to photograph.

Now let's cross our fingers and hope the clear coats go on without incident! I'm having good success with the Johnny Ramone Mosrite clear coats, so let's hope everything will be fine...

Mosrite Ventures Mk II: The Paint is On!

Well today I got the painting finished on the Johnny Ramone Mosrite Ventures Mk II (fingers crossed!!). In the end I put 4 coats of primer on there with a gentle sanding of 800 grit in between each. It would have only been 3 coats, but on the 3rd coat a mosquito got stuck in the primer and had to be extricated. Here's how she looked with the primer dry and ready for gloss.

With the body nice and clean and smooth after the primer, I was a tad hesitant to go ahead with the gloss. Nothing like taking a beautiful surface and marring it with some spray fail like drops of paint, insects or dust. Anyway, I had to bite the bullet sometime! And so it came to pass that, after two coats of gloss acrylic, with absolutely zero mishaps (phew!), the body came to look as it does now.

Do the photos really look any different?? Well, believe me they are ;). Two perfect coats of acrylic gloss white and now ready for clear coats. Yet another chance to mar the surface, but a chance which I'm going to have to take! I'm going to let the gloss acrylic cure for about a week before attempting clear coats to avoid any issues with cracking and so on.

Anyway, she's really coming together now. The neck has 8 coats of Tru-Oil and is feeling nice and smooth. Two more coats with 2000 grit wet sanding in-between and I'll call that done. Stay tuned punk rockers!!

Stone Roses Tribute: Second Pollocking Complete

Well the last dollop of colour went onto the sides of the Stone Roses RC-1 today. It's looking pretty good - definitely different from the first Pollocking attempt - but good all the same. It's more colourful this time around, and that's not a bad thing. I'm thinking about changing out the black pickup surrounds for white. What do you guys reckon?

Now that the colour coats are done I need to clean off the side of the binding (a little acrylic still made it on there in places), and scrape the top of the binding to provide a border around the top. After that is done I can get started on the clear coats. I'm thinking of going with Behlen satin nitro, but I'm also going to check out some satin poly sprays to see how they look. I've done paintings before with the poly spray and it really brings the colours out, but I'm not sure how long it would last on a guitar. I guess a few experiments are in order..

Stone Roses Tribute: Pollocking Almost Complete

After two rounds of colour I'm happy with the results of the my second Pollocking attempt. Maybe not as awesome as the first time, but that's Murphy's Law isn't it? When you leave your finish up to the vagaries of fate and gravity you gotta accept whatever results! I still have the sides to go, but see what you think:

The sides will take me another couple of days to complete, and then I'll be faced with the choice of clear coats again. I'm trying to find a reasonably priced, acrylic satin clear coat that comes in spray cans. If anyone knows anything cheaper than Behlen Satin Nitro, then please let me know!!

Stone Roses Tribute: 9th Colour Layer (Second Coming)

Well, the Pollocking is coming along (again) and hopefully I'm creating something that will come close to what we had before. The 9th colour layer (black) is on and I'm ready to start the cycle again. Here's what she looks like:

I think it's looking pretty good, but only time will tell. It's a lot more nerve-wracking this time around given that I had something special the first time! By way of comparison, here's what she looked like at this stage last time:

This time, I put more white on in layer 8, which has masked off quite a bit of the more brilliant colour layers. These will come back with the next colour cycle.

Surf Monster Telecaster: Seafoam v2.0

The first coat of seafoam green went on to the Surf Monster Telecaster v3.0 today. The primer levelled out nicely with 800 grit sandpaper and the first coat of seafoam green (in truth Ironlak 'Linz Iceberg' from Ozgraff) went on without a hitch. Looking at it now I'm really glad I went back to my original vision for this Tele.

This time around the Ironlak didn't splutter and drip like last time and I was able to lay down a nice thin, even coat. The secret was a finer spray nozzle - also courtesy of Ozgraff. The original supplied nozzle on all the Ironlak cans was ridiculously high volume, and I believe that this led to the coats being way too thick the first time around. I guess a high volume jet is just what the hoodies down by the train tracks need to realise their singular works of art, but it's not so good for creating nice even guitar colour (at least in my hands).

I've just about convinced myself that the the cracks in my first clear attempt was due to the paint underneath being way too thick (and therefore not dry or hard enough). I could be wrong (I'm certainly no expert) but this time around everything feels more normal; more like previous builds. I guess we'll see how it finishes up, but I'm quietly confident everything will turn out well. Famous last words!!

Surf Monster Telecaster: Paint Going On!

The Surf Monster Telecaster is really looking like something now. I sanded the body down to 400 grit, filled the pores with Timbermate and then sanded again down to 800 grit. Smooth as a baby's wassname. I didn't take a photo, but the wood looked really nice with the pores filled. Some really nice grain there. Looked almost like ash or alder - if this stuff is only basswood then i'll be buggered. Very nice! I admit that I did stop for 15 minutes to debate whether to change the finish to a stain, but I decided to forge ahead with the original plan.

After the sanding I hit the body with 3 coats of white primer, wet sanding the small imperfections with 1200 grit after each coat. No spray booth here in Holgate, so unfortunately the odd small bug got stuck in the finish. At one stage I did the unthinkable and tried to get rid of the bug with my finger in the wet finish. That's a paddling...! Anyway, with the sanding between coats it eventually came up very nice and smooth.

After the primer, it was time to shoot the colour. So far I've got one coat of Ironlak 'Linz Iceberg' on there and it's looking pretty sweet. A little too much colour for a perfect seafoam green, but I'm pretty darn happy with it anyhow! Should look great with the simple plain white pickguard. Or should I swap it out now for a perloid one??

 

There were a few issues with the first coat. Unfortunately, the Ironlak's spray can nozzle was spitting out drips like you wouldn't believe. These will need to be sanded out before the next coat. I have some replacement nozzles here (low volume thin line ones) so I may try one of them with the next coat, although a thin line nozzle really isn't the best for this application. I'll also sit the can in warm water for 10 minutes before spraying to help with the atomization.

This week I also received a set of GFS 63 Tele Vintage Wound Professional Series Pickups for this baby from Guitarfetish. Can't wait to get them in and hear what they sound like. Before that can happen, there's acrylic clear coats, the long wait until it cures, and the hours of buffing to get through.

I've also got 52 Tele Vintage Wound Professional Series Pickups waiting to go into the Flamed Telecaster, so it will be great to hear the difference between them!

Solid Body PRS: Headstock and Control Cavity Cover

A bit more progress on the PRS today. I traced the control cavity on the back of the guitar and cut a cover out of a pickguard blank for it. Successive trimming on the bench sander allowed me to get a reasonable fit. Not perfect, but not bad. It's very hard without the original routing template to go by (at least that's my excuse)!

I also got the headstock sprayed black and a couple of layers of Minwax Wipe-on Poly applied. It's not my best headstock attempt, but it will do in a pinch. I really should have sprayed it *before* applying the Wudtone to the neck (like I did for the Stone Roses Tribute) but I did the best I could under the circumstances. Lesson learned for next time > do all your staining and spraying before touching any Tru-oil or Wudtone!

Stone Roses Tribute: Video Build Diary #6

The sixth installment of my video build diary for the RC-1 Stone Roses Tribute is now on YouTube. This installment deals with the actual Pollocking of the front, back and sides of the guitar body and headstock. This is the fun part of the build and I get some help from my son Eben.

   

You can't quite see it in the video, but that very first chuck of light-blue paint was a little too enthusiastic and most of it went all over me. Nice one Eb!

Stone Roses Tribute: Psychedelic Pollocking Complete

Well today I finally finished the Pollock inspired colour coats on my Stone Roses Tribute build. With the last splatter coat in place on the sides, this boring piece of basswood has been transformed into a masterpiece of psychedelia :P. In the end the paint job came out very close to what I was shooting for and I think it looks awesome! I just can't stop going back to look at it!

All the masking went exactly to plan. There was quite a bit of paint on the top of the binding, and it took some very careful work with an exacto blade and my binding scraper jig to get it all clean. But, in the end, it's clean as a whistle and looking very professional indeed ;).

Next step is to decide on a way to get this bad boy clear coated. I am strongly leaning towards Minwax wipe-on poly for this one as it will be simple to apply and may well fill some of the valleys between splatter pretty nicely.