Ok, finishing newbie. I am reading all the online stuff I can find. Halp.

[AprioriMark]

First, I know it's annoying and stupid to ask questions that I can find answers to all over, but...  I'm one of those guys who learns through specific experience and direct advice from veterans who can speak directly to the hows and whys of a situation.  I then enjoy backfilling my lack of understanding with educational literature.  So:

1)  What finishing books do you all recommend?  I'm not going to do this professionally, but I would like to do a few guitars and basses myself.  I'm interested in dyes and stains mostly, and not solid colors.
2)  I'm going to be finishing an ash Strat body that's roughly sanded at the moment and has a few nicks (the body has sat around for years).  How would you recommend prepping it for dye?  I'd like it to be something transparent eventually.  Pretend that I'm completely inexperienced with wood finishing but can learn quickly.
3)  I'm going to be stripping spray-on Poly from a birdseye maple neck.  What products would you suggest, and then what would you suggest to use as a new finish?
4)  Back to the guitar body, I read that Ash doesn't take stain well, so color would need to be applied between layers of clear.  How does this work?
5)  I'm also going to be applying significant water slide decals inbetween layers of clear.  It will be long lines of text, probably around the edge of the body like binding.  Any advice here?

-Mark

 

[TomK]

There's lots of questions here that would take lots of time.  The question about a book, I purchased the guitar finishing book Stewmac sells.  I'm not sure if its still available but it was a valuable resource for me.  The first project I did was to do a vintage burst on a alder strat using Nitrocellulose lacquer.  It came out great, if I take that guitar anywhere people assume its a NOS strat or something.  The Stew mac book has a lot of material on finishing however the version I have leans heavily toward nitrocellulose lacquer.  Having done a guitar with it I won't ever use it again.  On one hand its one of the easiest materials to use and its a great finish, on the other its a brain fryer and unless you have real spray booth and exhaust equipment your house will smell of lacquer which means all the occupants are breathing it.  Its nasty stuff for a human and its bad for the environment (I'm ready to be crucified here but its true).  I switched over to Target Coatings EM 6000 water based lacquer which has some challenges but overall its very clear and has a nitro feel when you touch it, and it won't leave you brain dead or ruin your well water. 

Other sources of information are books on furniture finishing.  Jeff Jewitt has a couple of books you can get in the library (remember libraries).  Despite what people may say finishing a solid body or re-finishing a neck has about 90% overlap with furniture (I make furniture and finish guitars).  Basically how to use dye stains, pigment stains, oil, varnish, shellac, lacquer etc. will be in one of his books.  My strongest advice is to post questions and read the answers, get a couple of books and above all some scrap wood.  I shot the burst on 3, 3/4" pine strats before I started on my Warmoth body.  I'm in the process of finishing a Tele and I have about 8 hours into getting just the right neck color for me using scraps of figured hard maple.  When your done all of this work you don't want to look at it and say "boy if I only would have...."  Make those mistakes on scrap wood and believe me it takes patients. 

 

[jackthehack]

1)  What finishing books do you all recommend?  I'm not going to do this professionally, but I would like to do a few guitars and basses myself.  I'm interested in dyes and stains mostly, and not solid colors.

Check other threads on various book recommendations.

2)  I'm going to be finishing an ash Strat body that's roughly sanded at the moment and has a few nicks (the body has sat around for years).  How would you recommend prepping it for dye?  I'd like it to be something transparent eventually.  Pretend that I'm completely inexperienced with wood finishing but can learn quickly.

Sand paper/elbow grease down to #320/400; how deep are the nicks? If they're minor you probably start with #180 and work your way down.

3)  I'm going to be stripping spray-on Poly from a birdseye maple neck.  What products would you suggest, and then what would you suggest to use as a new finish?

Hard to tell; poly finishes vary; just sand it back - #180 then #320/400 you'll go through some #180 stripping it off.

4)  Back to the guitar body, I read that Ash doesn't take stain well, so color would need to be applied between layers of clear.  How does this work?

Who said ash won't take stain/dye? Total B.S. What are you trying to do, be specific, give examples of the finish you're trying to replicate.

5)  I'm also going to be applying significant water slide decals inbetween layers of clear.  It will be long lines of text, probably around the edge of the body like binding.  Any advice here?

Don't exactly what/why you mean by that, elucidate....

 

[MUYFUE]

I only do solid colors, so I can't talk about dyes etc...BUT your idea of laying on text between layers of clear is intruiging. If done properly it can give a 3D effect.
ESP i think it was, did that on a guitar covered with CA$H and some bills were behind others in diff layers of clear...at least that's what it looked like.

I can foresee that strategy becoming a big pain, though, because you'd have to get the first layer of clear to cure, then buff it, apply the first level of decals, then wait, the repeat.

It might produce a cool visual though!

 

[AprioriMark]

4)  Back to the guitar body, I read that Ash doesn't take stain well, so color would need to be applied between layers of clear.  How does this work?

Who said ash won't take stain/dye? Total B.S. What are you trying to do, be specific, give examples of the finish you're trying to replicate.

5)  I'm also going to be applying significant water slide decals inbetween layers of clear.  It will be long lines of text, probably around the edge of the body like binding.  Any advice here?

Don't exactly what/why you mean by that, elucidate....

I was going through tons of old posts and thought I'd read that ash takes dyes unevenly.  I've had a few conversations where it was pointed out that I'm wrong, so I'm going to give it a go.  I'm just trying to make a deep emerald green dye job and then put something thick and shiny over it.  Nothing amazingly fancy.

As far as text, I'm using water transfer paper and a color printer to put some text on the body.  It's the same junk fender uses for headstock decals.  I'd thought about doing text carving/engraving (for another future project), but I wanted to see how cheesy the water transfer thing would be first.  I'm just not sure when in the finishing process to add the decal.

-Mark