Refinishing a neck

[nick]

Hi all,
Last week, my cat managed to bring down a bookcase on top of one of my basses (Maya Rickenfaker), also knocking out of it's stand, onto the carpet.

The finish on neck is 'shattered' in areas. However, this (luckily) seems to be the only damage, it still plays OK & thru-neck joint is fine - tough old bass.
Fragments of finish coming away from the neck are like shards of glass, & after during scraping a bit away - horrible smell leads me to believe that it's some kind of plastic (?)

I've played a few acoustics before with a satin-like finish which I liked the feel of. I would like to strip all the old finish off the neck, and rather than try to blend in patches, try to get as near as possible feel to a bare-wood neck.

Can anyone recommend anything to refinish bare-wood in a natural colour and how to do it?

Many thanks

[Kiwi]

Depending on how much wood is actually exposed, you could attempt a superglue repair. I've done it a number of times on instruments with stone chipped sized dings and you can obtain a near invisible finish repair if you buff the dried glue flush with a nail buffing pad from Boots.

[neepheid]

[quote name='nick' post='348629' date='Dec 8 2008, 02:10 PM']Hi all,
Last week, my cat managed to bring down a bookcase on top of one of my basses (Maya Rickenfaker), also knocking out of it's stand, onto the carpet.

The finish on neck is 'shattered' in areas. However, this (luckily) seems to be the only damage, it still plays OK & thru-neck joint is fine - tough old bass.
Fragments of finish coming away from the neck are like shards of glass, & after during scraping a bit away - horrible smell leads me to believe that it's some kind of plastic (?)

I've played a few acoustics before with a satin-like finish which I liked the feel of. I would like to strip all the old finish off the neck, and rather than try to blend in patches, try to get as near as possible feel to a bare-wood neck.

Can anyone recommend anything to refinish bare-wood in a natural colour and how to do it?

Many thanks[/quote]

I have refinished necks in two ways - with premix "French Polish" and nitrocellulose lacquer. The French Polish that I used will give quite a yellow tint to the wood:



The satin nitro is a lot more neutral:



The good thing about the "French Polish" is that you can do it at home without any special equipment other than making a "rubber" (cotton wool/wadding wrapped in cotton cloth). With nitro you [b]need[/b] a good mask whether you're using aerosols or an air gun (one with filters, not a simple dust mask), a ventilated area to do it where it doesn't matter about the stink, no sources of ignition etc.

Both approaches involve removing the old finish. I sanded, started off with something rough like 80 grit to get the finish off, then working up the grades - 160, 280, 400, 600 etc. I stopped at 600, seemed smooth enough to me.

As for applying finish, many thin coats are better than a few thick ones.

[nick]

Thanks for the tips.
There's too much damage to finish for spot repairs.

Ideally, once down to bare wood, I'd like to leave it, but guess it would get grubby fairly quickly.
After something pretty minimal as far as refinishing is concerned, that wouldn't make the neck look too different in colour to the natural maple finish body...

[Stewart]

[quote name='nick' post='348814' date='Dec 8 2008, 04:56 PM']...
Ideally, once down to bare wood, I'd like to leave it, but guess it would get grubby fairly quickly.[/quote]

Maple really needs to be completely sealed from the environment (Nitro/Polyester/Some-other-lacquer) - at least according to Warmoth.
Musicman basses mostly seem OK with oil-finished Maple though (I believe)...

[Mr. Foxen]

I recon a catskin strap would set that bass off nicely. Oil finish is probably the way, but I have no idea how you'd blend the edge to where the body finish starts, I picture the oil seeping underneath and lifting it.

Edit: spelling

Edited December 8, 2008 by Mr. Foxen