It's arrived...

[Strat Avenger]

'Nothing you guys haven't seen before. 'Just expressing my satisfaction. It's a beautiful piece of Alder (well, two pieces) and not a single blemish anywhere (just like the Soloist body I got from W).

'Still waiting on the neck, but I don't think it will be long.

:toothy10:

 

[rapfohl09]

Looking good! Are you drilling your own control positions?

 

[Strat Avenger]

Looking good! Are you drilling your own control positions?

No, you probably can't see from the glare of the lighting, but there is one hole in the pickguard for the volume knob, and the slot for the 5-way switch.

 

[Strat Avenger]

And now it has a neck.  :icon_biggrin:

 

[bagman67]

What's the plan for finishing?

 

[mayfly]

What's the plan for finishing?

My plan would be just to send the works to Tonar  :headbang:

 

[Cagey]

He does some fine finish work. I got to see an example in person when I put together Tipperman's Jaguar. First rate stuff. No compromise. Fender would have been envious.

 

[Strat Avenger]

What's the plan for finishing?

For the neck, my "plan" is a bit unorthodox.  What I think I wanna do is a satin clear-coat on the fretboard and face of the headstock, and then the entire back of the neck in Tru-Oil.

I don't yet know (but should know soon) if the clear-coat will be urethane, polyester, or lacquer.  I tend to want to avoid lacquer because it takes a long time to dry, and can be "sticky".

The body will be a solid (what Fender calls ) "Vintage White" (actually a pale yellow).

 

[Stuart973]

Yeah, just received my first warmoth body. Simple two piece swamp ash body but... I am super impressed. Shows the care they take and quality of wood they are working with.

 

[Cagey]

I don't yet know (but should know soon) if the clear-coat will be urethane, polyester, or lacquer.  I tend to want to avoid lacquer because it takes a long time to dry, and can be "sticky".

Actually, lacquer dries almost immediately. Almost right out of the gun. It's just not hard enough to buff to a fine sheen for a couple weeks. Past that, the stuff is pretty brittle. It's one of the drawbacks of the finish - it'll chip/scratch pretty easily. But, if you take care to treat it right, it's a fine finish. It's about as good as it gets for home finishing.

You have the same problem (if you want to call it that) with poly. You can't mess with it for a couple/few weeks or longer. That's why Warmoth adds about month or longer if you get a finished neck/body. Takes a while for the stuff to really cure to its full hardness. On the plus side, it's as close to indestructible as it gets.

The various "oil" finishes never do harden to the degree lacquer or poly do. You can get them to look good if you work hard enough at it, but they're still relatively fragile. The only thing they have going for them is you can do them in your living room if you want to.

 

[croquet hoop]

What I read about lacquer is that it dries reasonably fast, but never fully cures (but it should not remain sticky either).

In any case, if you don't care about semantics, Cagey is right, most finishes need to rest a few days/weeks before final polishing, so go for the one that's easier to apply for you.

 

[Cagey]

Oh, it cures hard in a matter of weeks. But, it'll continue to shrink for quite a while past that. That's why you'll see old lacquer finishes all spider-webbed. The modern formulations generally won't spider-web on you, although I'm not sure enough time has gone by to prove that out yet.