tng6664 Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 hello,I have an '02 LP studio- red/burgundy with gold hrdware. I want to change the color,the hardware, and there is a couple nicks/gouges??? that i'll have to repair. I also want to try and slim down the neck a little.So here's a bunch of questions to start out with. I have never done anything like this,,and i know i'm taking a big chance on pi**ing up the looks of a descent conditioned guitar. Worst case in my opinion is i have to take it afterwards and pay someone to fix my screwup. But I do want to atleast attempt to do this myself regardless of the outcome.So,1st:Advice on grade of sandpaper to start with down to finishing grade please.2nd:what type of filler to use for the bad dings? it will have to be filled and reshaped. The dings aren't too bad to where i don't think i can't handle the reshape.3rd:What type of paint?,,primer? do i need to prime paint then coat?4th:I saved this for last as this is my main concern/fear..The neck i'm not exactly sure but from speaking with others on here in the past i think i was told the '02 studio has the 50's neck which is fatter than the 60's neck which is what i believe i had on a '99 standard.i'm not positive on the year thing,,but the neck on this is a little fatter than i prefer. Advice please on how to thin this up? I don't have to thin it up,,but while i'm doing this i might as well go ahead and try to change everything to my preference. I'm no where near a guitar repairman--luthier??,,,not even a basic carpenter,,but as i said i want to at least attempt this.So please give me some advise,tips, hints. I'm not trying to do this over the weekend,i'm not in a hurry, i can take my time.Also if there's another place,category or somewhere i should post this please let me know. Thanx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strat-o-steve Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 My advise to you is this : You CAN learn to do this type of stuff yourself, and actually end up with great results. But, you cannot just jump in to it blind either! Do what I did, and buy books about this type of work. Dan Erlewine has a good all around book called the Guitar Player's Repair Guide. With any finish work, you need to be patient, and do proper prepping before applying any finish. This will include fixing, sanding out or filling chips and dings in the wood. You also need to seal the wood with grain filler if you will be applying finish on bare wood. It would take way too long to explain in great detail how to do all the things you wished to do to this guitar. Basically for the neck, you could slim it down a bit with just sand paper. Just always go slow cause you can always take away, but you cannot add to. If you are going to paint the guitar a solid color, I wouldn't remove all of the original finish down to the bare wood. I would just fill in the chips and dings, sand it enough to level the entire surface (and add a little texture so the paint can stick). Prime and paint the guitar, sanding and wet sanding. Then add a few coats of clear to add shine and seal in the color coats. But buy a few books, and you will read up on all of this stuff! :D Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stein Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 Like STRATOSTEVE says, you CAN do it. The question is, will you get the results you want on the first attempt. I would HIGHLY recommend investing in a more suitable "base" for your project before you invest the time into that one. For one, THAT guitar is one of the better studio models. The finish you are proposing to remove is already a high quality finish, and is the equal of a standard. There are a LOT of studio models you could get used (or new) that have faded finishes that you would actually be UPGRADING, as well as saving yourself a lot of work stripping and/or prepping. You could also find one with a neck profile you like better. On the subject of carving a neck (I have modded a couple) it is more of an art that takes practice, and there is more to a neck shape than just thick or thin. How much shoulder it has, and how much wood you have at the width matters just as much, and I think MOST Gibson 50's style necks have less shoulder than the 60's necks. So you can't simply take a 50's neck and take some wood off and have it be a 60's neck. And really what I am trying to say, is taking wood away from a good feeling neck on your first try at it is more likely to make it feel worse to you, and you are likely to experience surprise at how FAST and easy it is to get it too thin by shaping and rounding to make it feel right. Really, my point and advise is not to do your project, but to do it on one that can USE it, that you are improving and will reward you with a sense of accomplishment, rather than putting all the work into CHANGING something that you may not be improving. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
damian Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 I suggest buying a cheap e-bay guitar, or one from Goodwill, or your local paper, or such.....20 - 50 bucks, and work on that one first.......LEARN first........Oh, and, find Andy's thead........ [thumbup] ......... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy R Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 I guess i will start with a couple of questions first. Why? Why do you want to try this and why this guitar? What? What do you want to achieve? Is this about learning to do this stuff or is it about making improvements to a guitar you want to keep forever? What is the end result? What color do you want it etc... Risk? Are you willing to lose the money you spent on the guitar to begin with? Are you willing to buy the right tools for the job? Are you willing to start over and scrap hours or days of work ( and money) to get it right? Are you willing to accept the fact that this guitar might never be a playable instrument again? Do you have other guitars to play? Are you extremely patient? Are you tenacious? Think about this and the advice given above by the others here. If you still feel like this is what you want to do then go for it. I will answer anything I can to try to help you. Spend some time on the MLP forums looking and reading before you even start.... Not trying to discourage you just want you to know what you are getting in to. Post some pics of the Guitar you are wanting to customize.... Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tng6664 Posted June 26, 2011 Author Share Posted June 26, 2011 ok,,I've come to this:I will not attempt anything on the neck,because of my lack of exp.and as I said it's not that big of an issue.The comments you guys put up so far helped with that one,,,lack of exp.,possibly messing up the neck,making it unplayable.Thanx...However I am going to change the color.A couple of reasons,no offense to anyone but i've never liked red/burgundy or anything similar to it on a guitar for myself.Don't get me wrong I've seen some beautiful guitars with these colors,it's just not my preference.On this one,I got what i believe was a good deal on it.The thought of hurting future value or anything like that is no concern.I have only 4 right now but they will never leave me.I have owned a lot of guitars over the years and regrettably have let alot slip away. I was on here a couple mnths.back talking about doing some trades and a couple people reminded me of how much I miss collecting on a small level.Anyhow I have always wanted a LP with one solid color of a root beer/deep orange color.The color is hard to explain,so I will post some pics. of my LP that I want to do this to and the color i want to change it to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy R Posted June 26, 2011 Share Posted June 26, 2011 ok,,I've come to this:I will not attempt anything on the neck,because of my lack of exp.and as I said it's not that big of an issue.The comments you guys put up so far helped with that one,,,lack of exp.,possibly messing up the neck,making it unplayable.Thanx...However I am going to change the color.A couple of reasons,no offense to anyone but i've never liked red/burgundy or anything similar to it on a guitar for myself.Don't get me wrong I've seen some beautiful guitars with these colors,it's just not my preference.On this one,I got what i believe was a good deal on it.The thought of hurting future value or anything like that is no concern.I have only 4 right now but they will never leave me.I have owned a lot of guitars over the years and regrettably have let alot slip away. I was on here a couple mnths.back talking about doing some trades and a couple people reminded me of how much I miss collecting on a small level.Anyhow I have always wanted a LP with one solid color of a root beer/deep orange color.The color is hard to explain,so I will post some pics. of my LP that I want to do this to and the color i want to change it to. Sounds good. My concern was more about you regretting your decision and if you could live with and afford the results of it. I'm not a huge fan of Burgundy either but as you said have seen some nice looking Burgundy guitars. So my next question would be is the RootBeer/Orange going to be a solid color or translucent? If it is going to be a solid color it will be much easier. If it is going to be translucent then you will have to do a lot more work. As mentioned above, if possible try to use the existing finish as the base coat. If you don't have to remove existing finish then don't. This will save you a ton of time stripping and cleaning a base coat that you will turn around and reapply. I would also recommend you stick with a Nitro lacquer finish. If you are going with a solid color I would begin by cleaning the guitar real well with warm water and dish soap. Then I would give it a wipe down with rubbing alcohol. That should remove all of the oils polish, grease etc... from the finish before you start sanding. Once you have done this get some rubber sanding backers from an automotive parts store. I know pep boys and O'Rileys has a good selection. You want to avoid sanding just using your fingers when possible. Next you will want to use some 400 grade sand paper and wet sand the whole guitar. Use warm water with a little dish soap and let your sand paper soak in it for 10 or 15 minutes. What you want to do is rough the surface up so that you can apply your new finish to it. This way the new finish will have something to bite in to and hopefully actually begin to melt into the original finish. This will prevent the finish from separating and cracking/flaking off in the future. As you are wet sanding work on 1 area at a time and use a flexible piece of rubber as a squeegee to wipe away the water and sanding remnants every minute or so. When you do you want to see the finish have a dull haze. Anything that is shiny either needs further sanding or is a deeper scratch, or ding. You will have to use your best judgment if you think you can sand enough to remove the scratches or dings without sanding through the finish. If you have some deeper scratches or dings/chips you should try to fill these using lacquer if possible and build the finish back up to the surrounding finish. Nitro sanding sealer works well for this. Once your base finish is nice and flat and scuffed then shoot your base color. When you spray you want a nice wet coat. That doesn't mean "Thick" coat. What you want to avoid is "Dry Coating" this happens when some of the finish drys in the air before it reaches the surface you are painting. It will look and feel "sandy" on the surface and is not what you want. When spraying make sure you have good light so you can see the reflection of the wet paint so that with every pass you overlap the previous pass by a few inches. This will prevent a striping look. If you do it right within a few minutes you shouldn't see the spray over laps. For your base color you only need to give it enough coats to make the color solid enough so you can't see through it and be able to give it a light wet sand ( 400 grit) ( without burn through) before moving on to clear coats. Depending on how well you prepped the base coat and how well you sprayed the color coat you may not even need to sand between the color and clear coats. If you have a lot of orange peel or runs ( it happens) in the color coat you will want to knock that down before moving on to your clear. The color coat doesn't have to be absolutely perfect because the clear will melt into the color coat as you proceed. Keep the color coat down to a minimum! For the clear coats follow the directions for application. There are a few ways that you can approach finish coats. 1 is applying wet coats, waiting for it to dry for a certain amount of time. Doing a light sanding scuff coat in between and doing this until you have built up enough coats to provide the thickness needed to prevent damage to the color coat. Another approach is that you spray slightly thinner coats and before they have completely dried you add another coat. This allows each coat to melt into the next without sanding in between each coat. You have to be careful with this method that you don't do it too soon or you will get "finish Sagging" The main principle to finishing is that each coat of finish actually melts into the last so that it forms one solid coat when you are done. If you let the finish dry too much between coats you need to rough the surface up again to get the next coat to bite and melt in to it properly. If you don't you will end up with a bunch of individual coats that will want to chip and flake off... In the end you need enough layers of clear that you can wet sand out all the orange peel and runs with out sanding into or through the color coat. Some tips... You will need to find a pattern for spraying that works for you. I usually start in the cutaways and do the sides then the back and front. The key to a good spray is maintaining a consistent distance and speed so that you are applying a wet coat but not a "Thick" coat. The closer you spray the wetter it will be but the faster you have to move. Watch your overlaps so you don't end up with a dry edge Runs will happen and can be sanded out later Don't engage the spray in the middle of your pass ( I try to not release the spray at all unless necessary ) This prevents dry spray and spray nozzle sputter When you are done you will sand off about 50 percent of what you sprayed on depending on how smooth and even the spray flowed. When sanding watch the edges of the guitar. The finish will be thinner on sharper edges Start with 400 grade wet and work until the entire finish is dull and flat ( This where you remove the orange peel and any runs ) Work your way up through different grades of paper following the same procedure while alternating your sanding direction between grades Once you have reached 1500 grade or 2000 grade then move to compounds and buffing Some people use a circular motion for compound and polish buffing. I tend to try to keep a straight direction so that any tiny scratches are all going the same direction. When you use a circular motion fine scratches are produced in all different directions and will appear when light hits them from any direction. If you only go one direction they can only be seen if held in the light at a certain angle.... Good luck! Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tng6664 Posted June 26, 2011 Author Share Posted June 26, 2011 Andy,thanx for the step by step,,you pretty much took care of all questions.And i'll be going with a solid color,as you said will be easier.I'm definitely going to be doing this in small steps where I can.So, I should be ok..,,if i get dumb,lost,confused,i will be back.I'll put up some pics. soon of how it looks now.Again, Thanx guys. Andy you da man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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