Spraying and finishing

[ChunkyMunky]

Who here sprays their own guitar builds? What kind of set up do you use? Show it all off! 

I'm about to dive right into it but I'm a bit lost and unsure where to start. Any advice for a beginner finisher, please?  

[Si600]

I used Halfrauds rattle cans on my only sprayed build. It came out OK, but I didn't lacquer it, so it left paint on the guitar stand for a while until it hardened off properly.

[Geek99]

I found car nitro on ebay in big 500ml cans 

lots in the can, went on well and seemed to melt into lower coats. Beware what colour undercoat you use. I needed grey to get off white

 

[Reggaebass]

I’ve used  rust-oleum clear satin , and gloss lacquer spray,  from B&Q  and found them really good , as long as you let it dry out properly, and nib down between coats . And wear a mask 🙂

[Jabba_the_gut]

I'm just finishing something with Morrells nitro spray cans. Getting quite a nice finish so far.

[Grangur]

@Jabba_the_gut Morrells make excellent rattle can finishes. I used to use them when I was working in furniture.

I've had some good results with Halfords rattle cans.

The secret to a good result is in the preparation. Make sure to sand if down well and get rid of all dents and lumps.

Also, when you've sprayed and have tiny dust in the finish, use the back of sand paper to rub over the dry finish to get rid of these bits. It saves rubbing down and starting again.

[Jabba_the_gut]

Here's the semi hollow bass I'm completing at the moment sprayed with rattle cans of satin nitro. The finish is really nice.

[ChunkyMunky]

1 hour ago, Jabba_the_gut said:

Here's the semi hollow bass I'm completing at the moment sprayed with rattle cans of satin nitro. The finish is really nice.

'Really nice' being a slight understatement, huh? 😎

[honza992]

I use an HVLP turbine and spray water based polyurethane - General Finishes High Performance and their Milk paints for colours. 

Would I recommend it? Ummm....I'm only a few in and for me it's certainly no easy option, or at least I don't find it easy.  Extraction, face masks, lighting, endless coats, sanding dust, sand-throughs.....I'm just finishing a cream P/J (and will update the long dormant thread) and until this afternoon I swore I would only use Shellac, wipe-on poly, or Tru Oil from now on.  I hate spraying, but.....oh my, it's ended up lovely.  Smooth, silky, beautiful....

If you want to spray nitro then it has advantages over water based poly.  The layers melt in to each other so the process is all a bit easier.  However, unless you have excellent explosion-proof extraction you can only use aerosol cans outside.  And even then the fumes are pretty awful while spraying, and the body gives off lots of fumes while drying.  It is possible to brush on nitro (and in fact I'm just finishing one now that was mostly brushed, thread awaits) but I'm not sure I would recommend it. 

So, largely, I would say I hate spraying.  But YMMV, obviously.  There's a great waterbased thread on Talkbass which is the gospel if you want to go that route.  Though the finishes they use there are impossible to find here.  Lots of them use cheap HVLP systems that painters use.  If you're doing more than two or three guitars then it would work out cheaper than aerosols, and I think the results would probably be similar. 

So my advice, is wipe-on poly or tru-oil applied with a rag!  But if you are in the Nottingham area and want to pop in to the workshop to talk through what I do, you'd be very welcome. 

 

[Jabba_the_gut]

30 minutes ago, ChunkyMunky said:

'Really nice' being a slight understatement, huh? 😎

Cheers! I think it is just like @Grangursaid, that time is needed in the preparation to get a good starting point. I do like Morrells sprays, they seem to give a fine, uniform spray and don't 'splutter' in my (very limited) experience.

I'm very inexperienced when it comes to spraying things - I do have a small compressor and cheapish spray gun that I have used when applying water based lacquer on a few builds. I've had reasonable results but It's something I would like to spend more time practising - I'm really impressed by professional sprayers and the finishes they get. You could build the nicest bass from the best woods but a poor finish will make it look poor.

I guess it also helps to have plenty of room, a booth and decent equipment but this is something out of reach for most of us and probably the reason we often opt for wipe on finishes like oils!!

What sort of set-up are you thinking of or trying?

[Jabba_the_gut]

@honza992 summed it up better than I did!!

[Grangur]

The other thing worth doing is spending time cleaning the area where you will be spraying. Getting rid of dust and dirt.

Also, wear a face mask. You may be tempted to be macho and go without. Simply, don't even try unless you have good extract. It's not only unpleasant,  it does damage to your lungs.

Edited March 22, 2019 by Grangur

[Norris]

I used clear gloss nitrocellulose rattle cans from Manchester Guitar Tech with good results. 

As others have said, watch the fumes!

[Cuzzie]

@Jabba_the_gut is very talented and modest - bravo

[JPJ]

I’m a big fan of Rothko and Frost rattle cans. I like to stand them in warm water for about 10 to 15 minutes before agitating them. I seem to get less spatter that way. The secret to a good finish is preparation of the surface and primer layers, and then hours and hours of flatting and wet sanding and buffing to achieve the finished result.

[Geek99]

On 22/03/2019 at 17:54, Jabba_the_gut said:

Here's the semi hollow bass I'm completing at the moment sprayed with rattle cans of satin nitro. The finish is really nice.

Oh my fuc king goodnight 

[Maude]

On 27/03/2019 at 21:57, JPJ said:

The secret to a good finish is preparation of the surface and primer layers, and then hours and hours of flatting and wet sanding and buffing to achieve the finished result.

Sorry to disagree but hours and hours of flatting and wet sanding and buffing is the result of poor prepping and application of paint.

[Ricky 4000]

For a painted finish, I do wonder if it's an idea to do the prep' yourself, then take it to a car bodywork place to get it professionally sprayed with colour and lacquer? 🙂

[Jimothey]

4 hours ago, Ricky 4000 said:

For a painted finish, I do wonder if it's an idea to do the prep' yourself, then take it to a car bodywork place to get it professionally sprayed with colour and lacquer? 🙂

I'm with you on that, the amount of times I've sanded through the colour or the paint has reacted in some way (even though I've wiped it down with degreasing wipes and not touched it with my bare hands!!) and I've had to sand it back and respray it it would have probably been cheaper to send it off to be finished professionally and a lot less hassle!! But saying that I'm still going to start spraying my P bass White tomorrow!?! 😳 

[Ricky 4000]

4 minutes ago, Jimothey said:

I'm with you on that, the amount of times I've sanded through the colour or the paint has reacted in some way (even though I've wiped it down with degreasing wipes and not touched it with my bare hands!!) and I've had to sand it back and respray it it would have probably been cheaper to send it off to be finished professionally and a lot less hassle!! But saying that I'm still going to start spraying my P bass White tomorrow!?! 😳 

Good luck! 👍

I've had a fair bit of frustration with using rattle cans over the years (mostly on bits of motorbikes).

One time I baked some painted parts in the oven, which turned out OK, except by some complete coincidence - my pies etc tasted of paint for about a month after... that was weird...

[Al Krow]

On 22/03/2019 at 17:54, Jabba_the_gut said:

Here's the semi hollow bass I'm completing at the moment sprayed with rattle cans of satin nitro. The finish is really nice.

Wow!!!

Can't wait to see what the finished bass looks like.

Are you doing this build work just as a hobby or are you taking 'commissions'?

[Jimothey]

I've just used the Rust-oleum all surface satin rattle can which I'd never used before and it's come out OK, they have a nice wide fan spray pattern with nice coverage I didn't grain fill as I wanted to still see the grain through the paint 😀

 

[Jabba_the_gut]

21 hours ago, Al Krow said:

Wow!!!

Can't wait to see what the finished bass looks like.

Are you doing this build work just as a hobby or are you taking 'commissions'?

Cheers! Will have this bass finished this week. Couldn’t resist a little play whilst I had the preamp  temporarily connected - the bass (not my playing..) sounded really nice!

I’ve only really been making basses as a hobby; there are a couple of people who have basses I’ve built but these weren’t made specifically for them. I am going to start looking at commissions as I’m running out of room at home for things I’ve made!! 

Cheers again