Vintage Strat body finish help

[cser24]

New to the forum and new to guitar finishes.
I will soon be buying a Warmoth swamp ash vintage Strat body and am looking for some tips/advice. I want to do a vintage style thin Nitrocellulose finish but have zero experience and plan on learning the process as I go.
First I wanted to see if anyone could confirm that the Warmoth vintage strat bodies were solid one piece ash. I am assuming they are but some of the pictures are hard to tell. Also I will be picking one of the pre-made bodies they have in stock and wanted to know if they come pre-sanded.
I know Ash needs grain filler and wanted to know if anyone had any recommendations as to which product works well. Also what color would look good with an ash body.
I have access to a spray gun and I am planning on getting the Behlen stringed instrument lacquer for the clear coats and mixing it with the ColorTone liquid stains("vintage amber" and "tobacco brown"?) for the color coats. I am going for a 50s style two tone burst. Anyone have experience using these products?
I want to make sure I am as prepared as possible before I dive into this project so I appreciate any help I can get. Thanks.

 

[Tonar8352]

The showcase guitars will designate if it is a one piece body so you can know in advance.  As far as finish sanding goes Warmoth does a great job but I always do a little final prep with 320 before I start.

Here is a step-by-step but there are a bunch of finishing threads that I do 2-tone sunburst's with step by step pictures and descriptions. If you do a search on 2-tone sunburst you will find a bunch of threads I did 2-tone bursts in. http://www.unofficialwarmoth.com/index.php?topic=2971.msg30614#msg30614

 

[Ace Flibble]

As Tonar says, the Showcase highlights when a body is 1-piece. Otherwise the only way to get a 1-piece body is if you phone in your order to Warmoth directly. (To be blunt about it, some other companies let you specify that you want a 1-piece body on their online order forms, and I don't know why Warmoth does not offer this option.)

Sanding-wise, they seem to sand to 220 or 320 grit. Doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to which bodies end up with which. In any case, I would always sand any body I buy, no matter who from and how far they prepared it. Making sure yourself that everything is sanded properly is just a part of good finishing. Personally, for ash I like to sand to 400 grit.

For grain filler, with a 2-tone burst I'd go with clear filler. A mahogany- or walnut-brown filler can also be nice, if you want the grain to stand out more. Can't recommend brands as what's available varies greatly from country to country and yours isn't listed. Though in any case, grain filler isn't a complicated product and you can go to your nearest DIY store and pick up whatever they happen to carry.

Mixing colours can get tricky and result in uneven hues if you're not very careful. Amber for the middle and tobacco brown for the edges is common, yes, although most 50s 2-colour bursts are actually black at the edges. So if you want a really accurate finish, what I'd do is first spray the outer burst with a mix of black & tobacco brown. Pure black can look a bit too extreme, but adding just a little to darken the brown will get you closer to a 50s style of burst. Also consider mixing in a little of the tobacco brown with the amber depending on whether you want a more yellow middle hue (amber by itself) or a deeper orange/brown. 50s bursts vary a lot because both the wood and paint was inconsistent in colour, so some people think of them as being very yellow and others think of them as being quite brown in the middle. The darker the wood is, the darker the final colour will be. So you have the right colours in mind, just be prepared to mix them up more than you may have thought, to get exactly the colour you want.

Also be sure to buy all the paint you need at once. It's really easy to underestimate how much you need, and if you end up ordering more at a later date, that batch might vary in hue and intensity from the first batch. So it's better to order an extra can/bottle/tub/whatever the first time around, so it's (hopefully) all from the same batch and will be identical.

 

[cser24]

Thanks for your replies. I've been doing a ton of research for this project. I ordered a one piece light swamp ash body and expecting it in a few days.