Wanted: thin, hardwearing, glossy finish for solidbody guitars

[Phil Mailloux]

If you only spray clear through your rig it takes two minutes to clean the gun. Empty the gun, put thinner in it, shake it up a bit, spray the thinner out to clean the nozzle, wipe the inside and outside with a towel full of thinner and voila! If you're going to use the gun a couple of times a week there's no need to pull it appart everytime. The problem is when you use stained lacquers, especially with the stewmac colortone stuff in it. That takes an eternity to clean

[MoonShine]

Thanks fella's, 'semi-gloss', ouch!...thats what I have now compared to the original finish on this old acoustic guitar.
Was going to ring Miro - Camden Park tomorrow morning Tues., and check out their ultra gloss finishes so may have to look at getting my compressor back off the bloke who borrowed it, 3 years ago, and sounds like I may just have to get a 4lt tin.

I'm in a Blues forum discussing finishes for specifically acoustic guitars, and on many occasions it has been noted to use a hard setting lacquer to ensure a good tone. Like these blokes are talking about very expensive acoustic guitars.
With that in mind I'm not going to take the gamble and destroy it with a polyurethane or other 'hard wearing' floor applications just in case. Going to read through the many posts in this great site and do my homework thoroughly before taking the plunge.

One thing I've found frustrating, I bought some 2000 Wet & Dry paper and can't remember where I got it from, and apparently you can also get finer around a 2400 (or even 2600?) grade?
Checked out and rang all the local Auto Accessory and Hardwares around the place and the finest they have is miles too course....around 1200.

I spend a lot of time going to Otto's off Magill Rd, SA., for burl veneers and even they don't have the ultra fine grades that I use before applying carnauba.

Looking up Ellie Erickson now thanks.

[soundman]

There are many good things about nitro laquer and one of them is that it cleans up very well, it is completely solvent resoluable which is great for clean up. You can also leave it in the gun without too much drama.
I often use GMH flat black for blacking speaker fronts and inside racks, which is a cheap/crude black nitro and have left the laquer in the gun for weeks on end, just keep topping it up, as long as you spray some product every day or so.... no problems.
Try that with enamel or polly and your gun will be most unhappy

Nitro is also hard & crisp which makes it good for tone.

it also lasts indefinitely in a well sealed can.

If I was just spraying gituars I'd get a hvlp gravity gun and alittle compressor an awway you go. spend...... $200-300 bucks maybe.


If buying mirotone get a tin of sanding sealer and a tin of the correct thinner.
For small stuff the fast thinner is probably ok.

cheers

[MoonShine]

I just sent an email off to this mob in NSW,
http://www.durobond.com.au/lacquers.htm
Hoping they'll send me in the right direction with their 851 Guitar Lacquer (Nitrocellulose)

[JupiterCreek]

Hi Moonshine

I get my clear K&H acrylic spray and spray tins of custom colours from Crash Supplies, 22-24 George St, Stepney 5069, ph 81329000. They also do wet and dry paper down to incredibly fine grits. P2400 I think

While you're there have a look at the foam backed abrasive pads. Stewmac call theirs Micro-Mesh Soft Touch Finishing Pads... Crash Supplies have the same stuff in little sheets about 4" x 6" or so and the stuff's priceless! As well as being great for finish sanding they're very handy for fret finishing too!

[MoonShine]

Top stuff, thanks for that Rob. Sounds like its not too far away from Otto's Timber yard where I get the sheets of veneer, think its Anne St., Stepney. Takes me ages to sort through all the burl veneer, decisions decisions.
Last one I got was Birdseye Maple, looks 3D with a heap of lacquer coats.

2400 awesome, the finest I've been able to get anywhere in the NE suburbs is 2000. Strangely Sprint, Repco and Auto Pro don't do it this fine?

[JupiterCreek]

Hi Paul

I just looked on Collins Industrial Supply's website and they list Tufbak Durite paper up to P2000 grit. When grits changed from Imperial to Metric in the 70s I think 2400 changed to P2000, but I honestly can't remember. Collins Industrial Supply are on Grange Road at Welland. Nice people to deal with and probably the best range of quality engineering products in SA.

[MoonShine]

Thanks Rob, got some veneer from Otto's and shot around to George St and picked up a few sheets of 2000.
Know where to go now, thanks for that. Now to make a veneer 'sandwich' with G clamps on this guitar head lol.

Ever tried that Selleys 308?...melamine formaldehyde glue? awesome. Dries like marble this stuff, left some in the mixing cup and ditched it before the missus found it missing.
Wasn't a Royal Doulton teacup, just a Salvo's special LOL.

[MoonShine]

No luck getting any Nitro from our local Mirotone, the gloss is now obsolete.

Got in touch with Durobond, NSW,
1 Ltr 851 Guitar Lacquer Clear Gloss $36.30
1 Ltr 1220 Premium Lacquer Thinners $15.40

Plus Postage/handling/freight...

Gonna be an expensive bloody geetar me thinks

[soundman]

I'd be very surprised if mirotine didn't still have gloss.
I know you cant get gloss in a spray tin, but

precatalised laquer comes in a variety of gloss levels from 30% to 100%.

precatalised is nitro but they don't tend to call it that.

I've never asked for "old time" nitro laquer always used pre cat.

cheers

[MoonShine]

I'll give them a ring again tomorrow morning thanks and will ask for precat super dooper gloss this time....fingers crossed.

[soundman]

The best thing to is ask to have a chat about product with a rep or teck consultant. Get a run down on the various products.
cheers

[durwood]

Not being into musical instruments I have skipped this thread before but opened it last night. Here are a few things to mull over.

Nitrocellulose lacquer or Duco as it is known in the automotive trade was discontinued in the 1980's after being released in 1924. It is a good fast drying paint that goes hard very rapidly (less than 24 hours) but is terrible out doors ,fades and cracks in months after application. It is only used in the furniture trade now and by some other smaller industries.

When it was used in the trade the finest W&D paper available was 600 (US standard) which is the same as P1200 (metric grade) which replaced the old grade in 1974.

Before that the smoothest grade we used on NC was 320 (which is the same as P320. If we needed to rub something out in the colour we doubled it upon itself and rubbed the sharp edges off the grit. The full gloss lacquer drys so shiny it was only ever rubbed to remove any faults and it was always sprayed to a gloss finish off the gun.

Mooonshine! If you want to get rid of the scratches you put in the finish just spray another thin coat of NC on the previous surface after you clean off the wax/polish.

If you use a spray can you have very little control but if you have a spray gun to apply NC start with 50-50 thinners and clear and after 3 coats reduce it to 70-30 thinners /clear then flow coat it with 90% thinners or if you can ( good enough at spraying) 100% thinner, someone mentioned retarder thinner this works even better as the paint stays wet for several minutes and the gloss level gets even better but you have to be careful you don't overdo it or you will get runs. If you apply more than about 5 -6 coats you run the risk of it cracking/crazing later in its life. Five coats is industry standard, if the total thickness exceeds 10coats it should be stripped off and started again.

You don't need to rub the surface unless it has faults, dirt or bad orange peel, the idea is to spray it wet enough so that it flows out flat before it sets. The correct gun set up makes this easy, if its not the correct one it won't spray properly.

The workshop I did my apprenticeship in did not have a spray booth or a buff, everything came of the gun, sometimes we used a rag and compound to reduce the gloss level to match other panels surrounding the new area as they always had fine burnish marks from being wiped with a rag to clean them or from polishing.

If you leave the NC for more than 4 hours on a normal 24 degree C day it will dry so hard the scratches will be hard to remove without heavy compounding. After 24 hours you will have great difficulty getting them out.

The fine papers were introduced in the late 80's to help in the application of acrylic urethane and acrylic lacquer which is an entilely different material. Its solvent is so strong that if you rubbed it with even 1200 paper it could blow up in your face and look like a garden rake had been used to rub it. A safer way to avoid scratch blow ups in the paint was to leave it thicker than normal and this produces orange peel. To remove it and to get a final gloss as it only gives about 70-80% gloss off the gun it was then rubbed backflat.

The fine papers 1500 -2000 helped as the scratches were so small only a tiny amount of buffing was needed to remove them. Acrylic also softens when heated so when you buffed and generated heat it helped soften the paint, only problem is you can melt the paint and gouge out the surface if its not dry enough or you overheat it. Acrylic lacquer takes 30 days to dry as hard as NC does in 24 hours.

In the furniture trade when TV cabinets were actually wood NC was the prefered finish. The cabinets were made out of a light coloured wood, stained to your colour -teak ,mahogany cedar etc and then sprayed with about three coats of NC. This was often done hot ( heating the lacquer) but sanding back and polishing compounding or waxing was not contemplated.

If marks were found the surface was rubbed with a pad with thinners on it to remelt and work out the fault. If you are old enough to remember such cabinets you will know the finish was as good or better than any furniture you will buy today.

[MoonShine]

Great stuff, thanks for the effort of submitting this valuable info Durwood.

[soundman]

Nitro is still the prefered finish in much of the furniture industry. be it in a number of modified forms.

Much of what you say about car method rings tru about modern nitro and timber finishing.... many recon it is pointless sanding past P240 for application of nitro and certainly not past P400 for denibing between coats (if necessary)

Yep those sanding scratches just melt out with the following coat.

Only use rertarder if you realy have to.

Another realy good thing is that if you stuff up big time, just wash it off with thinner and start again.

cheers