Hickory face plates

[jeff12]

Tru oil is great. Silky smooth finish when done. Steel wool between applications. No spray equipment needed. Dries fairly fast as long as you don't get to thick. Never tried to add color to it. I sprayed amber shellac
on maple for color then applied Tru oil over it with good results. Just put Tru oil on cherry with no base coats or color coat and it looks great.
May be the thing to try for your project.

[Phil_S]

What is "fairly fast?" Minutes, hours? I'm in Baltimore, MD. This time of year outside temp during the day is 50-65. When it's not raining, the humidity is probably 60-75%.

I did some reading on this. I think there was an article at StewMac and they seemed to really like it as an alternative finish, especially for necks. There was a great youtube. Elsewhere they were saying how easily the finish is damaged, but these panels aren't going to see any abuse. It's relatively cheap, too. I hope to find it somewhere that isn't W*mart. I don't like their labor practices and try to avoid the place.

I was in the dark. The name is a misnomer. It dries like a varnish. I was thinking it stays wet somehow!

[statorvane]

This time of year outside temp during the day is 50-65. When it's not raining, the humidity is probably 60-75%.

You can apply it inside. Apply thin coats and rub it in.

[sepulchre]

I found these informative:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9NQ33B7lfU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6zmitxywKU

A lot of thin coats seem to be the key. I'm interested because I'm about to build another head cab and, though tung oil works pretty well, I'd like to try something else.

I noticed that one of these says he puts on a a lot of coats and then buffs them to get a high gloss. Without the buffing it's semi-gloss at best. Has that been your experience, Tom?

[Structo]

I use Tru Oil on all my guitar necks.
A very slick finish indeed.

As was mentioned, you want to apply real thin coats as it will dry faster.
In a 72F house it will be ready for another coat in an hour or two depending on humidity.

It's not really an oil finish because it does dry fairly quickly.

Does that wood have open pores?

You can sand Tru Oil while it's wet to develop a slurry that can fill the grain.

If not, then sand the wood up to 320 or so.
You want it as smooth as possible to accept the TO.

Tru Oil will darken the wood slightly.
Wipe some Naphtha on the wood to see the true color.
That is pretty much how it will look with the TO.

I have heard of guys tinting Tru Oil but I have not tried that yet.

I would steel wool it after the second coat or so with #0000 wool.
(Make sure the surface is not tacky but dry to the touch.)

Always go with the grain.

I can usually get three coats on a day, sometimes four.

I use my fingers to rub it on. (wearing latex gloves is also good)


If you get runs then you are putting it on too thick.

For that piece I would probably put six to eight coats on.

After the last coat is applied, let it dry over night then steel wool it lightly.

Now you can leave it like that or if you want a glossy look, take a piece of old jeans and burnish the surface using some pressure.
It will shine up pretty good.

You can also wet sand and polish too, just like lacquer.
But make sure you put enough on that you don't sand through to wood at which point you would have to apply more.

You can find Birchwood Casey Tru Oil anywhere gun supplies are sold.

Hope this helps.

[Ken Moon]

This is long, but it works so well I had to post it (from John/basicaudio on AX84):

1. Sand bare wood to 220
2. Mix Boiled linseed oil, Minwax fast drying polyurethane and either Mineral
spirits naphtha or turpentine in equal parts for about a pint. It's not crucial to get it perfect at all. Naphtha is best for quick drying, mineral spirits is best to dry a little slower and lest you work a larger area.
Turpentine is about the same as min spirits as far as dry time.

3. Brush or wipe on the wood liberally as the bare wood witll soak it up well for the first coat. Keep going over dry areas until the wood doesn't soak up any more finish. Let it sit for 5-10 minutes then wipe dry with a rag. Make sure to get all the finish off as this will dry faster. Let dry
over night with a fan on the piece.
4. Repeat step 3 and let dry.
5. Get some 320 grit wet dry (Black, silicon carbide) sand paper. Brush on a coat of finish liberally and let it sit for a minute. Now sand the whole piece well with the finish on the sandpaper. You will get a thick pastey slury of varnish and wood dust which will fill in the pores of the wood, this creates a super smooth surface later. Wipe off the finish when you are done sanding everything. Make sure to get every area sanded and wiped off.It may look bad initially but it will get better...
6. Get some 400 grit sand paper and reapeat step 5.
7. Get some 600 grit and repeat step 5
8. keep going with 600 grit until you are tired of repeating it.
8. At this point you will have a super smooth surface built up.

You can go in a few directions now.
1. For a natural matte polished wood look buff with #0000 steel wool and then a clean soft cotton rag.
2. For a lustre type look buff with the steel wool and paste wax. Let the wax dry to a haze before wiping the wax off with a clean rag. Just like waxing a car.
Repeat this step a couple times at least, Then switch to a rag and very little wax. Let the wax dry completely and then buff off.
Repeat with just the wax and a rag. This is the method I use.
3. If you want a glossy mirror finish buff with steel wool and then spray
with a can of minwax gloss poly. Be careful with dust and spray light coats. This look looks like plastic
coated wood to me, so I don't use this finish...

That's about it.

John

(Ken) I used this method (using naptha and with the lustre finish) on this piece of bubinga, and it looks super deep (much better in person than in pic):


[img761]http://i514.photobucket.com/albums/t346 ... binga1.jpg[/img]
[img761]http://i514.photobucket.com/albums/t346 ... binga3.jpg[/img]

[Reeltarded]

Insane!

[M Fowler]

Wow that's over the moon.

[cbass]

That Is very classy Ken.

Try oil makes a nice finish for sure.its a lot of work .I've used it on gunstocks before

You can get a spray gun from a auto body supply for a bout 40$ A Gallon of lacquer for about 23$ and some thinner will go a long long way. And its so fast and easy and fairly tough

I like a French polish on the neck though

[Phil_S]

Ken, that's an amazing look. The wood I've got isn't figured like that. It's Plain Jane.

Meanwhile, I decided to mount with machine screws and inserts. Heck, why not? It seems I made an earlier panel from maple veneer plywood for the back but I didn't like the way it looked and set it aside, never making one for the front. I forgot that I'd actually mounted it and there were holes in the mounting blocks. Details, details, the devil is in the details.

To make a short story long, it turns out one of the holes is too close to where the new one needs to go and the drill runs out into the old hole. I've got 7 of the 8 inserts done. What to do here? I need something really hard to fill the old/new hole cluster fook. I have some car body putty -- it comes in a 1" cube -- one of those binary compounds you knead to make it cure. I made a little snake and stuffed it down into the hole. Let's hope it filled deep enough. Tomorrow, I'll be starting the new hole with a 1/16" bit and working it up very slowly while hoping for a hole that holds in the correct location. If that fails, I'll drill it out and shove a dowel and glue in it. I didn't want to resort to that as I was concerned about opening it up too much with less 3/4" to work with.

Hey, this thread turned into a really thoughtful discussion of finishes! I learned quite a bit.