"2020" Tele Custom

[redking]

This is the third of three guitars I built during my downtime in the summer.

This one is a roasted swamp ash body / roasted flame maple neck and fretboard.  It has the Mark Rutters bridge, locking Hipshot tuners, Jason Lollar Tele Special bridge pickup along with the Lollartron in the neck.  Neck is finished with a light coat of Tru Oil (face of the headstock Nitro) and the body was dyed as black as I could get it with aniline dye and finished with Behlen Stringed Instrument Lacquer (no pore filling)

This guitar smokes and has pretty much convinced me Leo got it right the first time!  Sounds great playing any style through every pedal and amp I have so far.  Probably my favorite guitar now.

 

[zebra]

Nice!

How did you go about applying the aniline dye - looks like you managed to get a pretty deep black for a dye job!

 

[redking]

Nice!

How did you go about applying the aniline dye - looks like you managed to get a pretty deep black for a dye job!

I did a few base coats of flake shellac to seal the body and then just kept rotating the body over and over, wiping it with a very concentrated mixture of the dye (water-based) with a soft cloth until the point where it wasn't getting darker any more.  The shellac base coats sealed the very bottom of the grain marks so that the dye did not penetrate the entire grain pattern and it had a cool effect in the end of making the grain very prominent.  One drawback was that there are still tiny specs of buffing compound that I can't get out of the grain in a few places that I would still like to figure out how to draw out.  I used a damp micro fibre cloth at first, then even tried naphtha with a shop towel and still couldn't get that last 2% cleaned out.  (Any ideas anyone?)

 

[PhilHill]

Nice!

How did you go about applying the aniline dye - looks like you managed to get a pretty deep black for a dye job!

I did a few base coats of flake shellac to seal the body and then just kept rotating the body over and over, wiping it with a very concentrated mixture of the dye (water-based) with a soft cloth until the point where it wasn't getting darker any more.  The shellac base coats sealed the very bottom of the grain marks so that the dye did not penetrate the entire grain pattern and it had a cool effect in the end of making the grain very prominent.  One drawback was that there are still tiny specs of buffing compound that I can't get out of the grain in a few places that I would still like to figure out how to draw out.  I used a damp micro fibre cloth at first, then even tried naphtha with a shop towel and still couldn't get that last 2% cleaned out.  (Any ideas anyone?)

Naptha and a tooth brush maybe.............. :icon_scratch:

 

[redking]

Nice!

How did you go about applying the aniline dye - looks like you managed to get a pretty deep black for a dye job!

I did a few base coats of flake shellac to seal the body and then just kept rotating the body over and over, wiping it with a very concentrated mixture of the dye (water-based) with a soft cloth until the point where it wasn't getting darker any more.  The shellac base coats sealed the very bottom of the grain marks so that the dye did not penetrate the entire grain pattern and it had a cool effect in the end of making the grain very prominent.  One drawback was that there are still tiny specs of buffing compound that I can't get out of the grain in a few places that I would still like to figure out how to draw out.  I used a damp micro fibre cloth at first, then even tried naphtha with a shop towel and still couldn't get that last 2% cleaned out.  (Any ideas anyone?)

Naptha and a tooth brush maybe.............. :icon_scratch:

Ya, maybe one with extra soft bristles so not to scratch the finish? 

 

[Strat Avenger]

I'm jealous. I didn't complete either of my 2020 builds (one Strat, & one Tele).
I have nothing to blame but my own laziness.