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I've only built a few guitars over the years.
But until this year, I'd only ever been able to finish them with oil. I had no spraying facilities and my attempts at using coloured wood stains had failed. Badly. So, back to plain oil finishes.
There's nothing wrong with oil. I even experimented a bit with some wet-sanding with oil, using waxes, etc. (Thanks to Wez for some tips on those).
I don't like bodies with thick coats of opaque paint. I don't like the feel. I'm sure that they don't sound as good. And you're never too sure what odd bits of wood have been nailed together to form the body - you can't see them.
I think it was Stonevibe who first posted a Wudtone finish thread, so I shall be forever indebted to him for introducing me to Wudtone! With Wudtone you get all the see-thru and feel-thru qualities of oil, but with the ability to add a little colour to the finish.
So, here are a few before/during/after pics of my experiments with Wudtone. I'm not going to bother repeating the full build threads that I did originally.
Before pic: A nice piece of Ash, in the shape-ish of a Tele;
The during pic: This is with the first coat of Dairy Blonde applied
And the final pic ...
That's got one of Ash's finest - a Diesel Tap. Brilliant pickup. And - clearly - the only pickup that that guitar needs!
The whole Wudtoning process was simple. Follow the instructions - mix up the colour blend that I wanted (actually, pure luck), apply it in a few light coats, and voila.
Nothing to do with Wudtone, but I love this neck ... one piece Rosewood, from Warmoth. Expensive, but wonderful.
Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
Comments
^^
That one worked well, so let's do another.
Before Pic: Another nice piece of Ash. Another Tele-ish shape;
During pic #1. This is Cherry Flamenco. First coat of the base stain coat.
IF only I'd known then, what I know now. That's too anaemic. I put the coat on as a light "dusting" of stain, much as I'd done the Dairy Blonde previously.
Wrong. This base coat stain has to be really pushed into the wood. Forced in with some hard rubbing. Don't flood the wood with stain that lays on the top ... but use plenty of stain with plenty of elbow grease to rub it deep into the body.
Once the first coat goes wrong, it doesn't matter how many more coats you put on, the colour never really deepens to the extent that it should.
I tried rubbing it down and trying again, but that didn't work either. I ended up doing a fairly radical piece of rubbing down ...
That exposed some pretty-much raw wood, and I could start again.
So, during pic #2. Looks a bit better-redder, huh?
Cherry Flamenco is actually quite a lot more complex than the Dairy Blonde. It comes with 3 separate stages of stain.
It's worth persevering with ...
Final pic;
And a third, abbreviated, photo story of using Wudtone;
This body had been in my "workshop" for about 5 years. No exaggeration. It was covered in dust, spider shit, and general workshop muck. This is with it cleaned up a bit;
And then cleaned up a bit more
Before pic; (A nice piece of quilted maple on a Korina body, since you asked!)
During pic #1. Cherry Flamenco again ... now you see it;
During pic #2. Cherry Flamenco again ... now you see it, and now you don't
Actually, that turned out to be a bit too aggressively sanded back for the finish that I was trying to achieve. So I ended up doing this one again too! With a couple of coats of Goldenrod over the top of the sanded-back Cherry Flamenco, this is how it was looking;
I thought about it for a week or two - as you can see, I'd stuck the neck in by this stage, so was a little reluctant to re-do it.
But I did re-did it. Best way of learning is to make mistakes, work out what they were and how not to make them again ...
This is how it's currently looking (same colour combo - Goldenrod over Cherry Flamenco) after a couple of coats of the gloss finish too;
Still plenty to do on this one too, but the Wudtoning work is done.
I've got a Wudtone Black Magic Woman kit waiting to go on a tele build I'm doing. Hopefully your experience will mean I'm less likely to do anything stupid.
I wouldn't bet on it. :-S
The cherry flamenco is a stunner, I'd have that any day! And the dc, well...
It looks like fire! Very prs.