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Thunderbird is go


T-Bay

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14 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

To be honest, this is one of the reasons I tend to use inks as stains. There are some issues with some specific colours with colour fastness, but the huge range of colours available from such as Diamine, and the very low cost, means that I can buy 4 or 5 shades and see which works best.  So far I've been lucky with colour fastness but I know some other folks have had issues.

The problem, though is that the actual colour is hugely influenced by the wood it's being applied to and sapele is a dark wood.  Now, if you were going for cherry red, I know exactly which ink I would recommend for both colour and colour-fastness...

I do like cherry red! I can’t resist at least getting some for a test.

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OK

For sapele, I would use this - Diamine Wild Strawberry  At less than £3 a bottle (and 30ml is plenty) you can afford to buy a shade darker and a shade lighter just in case your wood requires it.

Pete's EB3 tribute was done with it - figured mahogany top, sapele back, mahogany neck:

FnuKlmVl.jpg

B2qGKInl.jpg

Pete plays it every week and keeps it on a stand next to a picture window exposed to full light.  Two years later, it's still this colour.

And I used the same ink on this mahogany double cut junior, that has been hanging on my wall for nearly three years and, again, it is still this colour:

fs7yUAil.jpg

 

Personally, I think a Thunderbird would look great in this colour....

Edited by Andyjr1515
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1 minute ago, Andyjr1515 said:

OK

For sapele, I would use this - Diamine Wild Strawberry  At less than £3 a bottle (and 30ml is plenty) you can afford to buy a shade darker and a shade lighter just in case your wood requires it.

Pete's EB3 tribute was done with it - figured mahogany top, sapele back, mahogany neck:

FnuKlmVl.jpg

B2qGKInl.jpg

Pete plays it every week and keeps it on a stand next to a picture window exposed to full light.  Two years later, it's still this colour.

And I used the same ink on this mahogany double cut junior, that has been hanging on my wall for nearly three years and, again, it is still this colour:

fs7yUAil.jpg

 

Personally, I think a Thunderbird would look great in this colour....

Thanks, I just sent you a pm, just wondering how you apply it?

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37 minutes ago, T-Bay said:

@Andyjr1515 I have looked at the inks, wondering about flamingo and matador as one either side of the wild strawberry or would you go a bit lighter/ darker?

Yes - sounds a good set of options.  The Flamingo is a bit pinker and the Matador is a bit deeper, so between the three, you should be able to get what you're after.  I'll add a post on how I apply these shortly :)

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I'll cover the basic method I use and then a couple of variations.  Like always, I just will outline 'this is how I do it - and it consistently works for me - but I'm not saying this is how it should be done!'

It's very simple.  For a basic stained finish, non grain-filled, I do the following:

  • I sand down to 250 grit.  If it is a bought body, I take care that there is no releasing oil or similar on it and that I'm down to clean wood
  • I vacuum the body with a brush attachment to make sure all the dust is out of the grain
  • I apply the ink, straight out of the bottle, using a piece of old t-shirt or similar, bunched up and soaked in ink using a circular motion, making sure that the ink has properly gone into the grain.  Latex or nitrile gloves are essential unless you want very brightly coloured hands for a few days....
  • I let it dry and repeat if necessary.  2-3 coats is usually fine.  Remember that each coat will darken the end result
  • The colour when the ink is first applied and still wet is the best indication of what the finished, varnished, colour will be.  When the ink dries, it will look completely different - don't panic!
  • I let it dry fully
  • I finish it with Tru-oil or polyurethane varnish

If I need to fill cracks or grain, I use one of two methods.  Basically, the water-based ink will absorb differently on different woods and surfaces so, for example, if you sanding sealed it or used many types of filler, the ink colour would not absorb in those areas 

Grain Fill - Method one.  Stainable Timbermate

  • I use the dark stainable one
  • 68IR6Ynl.jpg
  • This veneer had multiple deep fissures.  The Metolux Timbermate will mix with water stains and - to an extent - absorb stain once dry.  For best results I do both
  • I mix some ink into the Timbermate
  • jWsHw7fl.jpg
  • Then prefill the gaps, then when the timbermate is dry and sanded, apply the stain in the normal way
  • hf02Uq0l.jpg
  • If I had just filled with the Timbermate out of the tub, the filled areas would have shown up as lighter shades.  If I'd used the 'light stainable' Timbermate, even premixing ink into it, the same would happen.  Using 'dark, stainable' Timbermate, premixed, the filled areas end up the same shade or slightly darker, both of which look fine on the finished result

Grainfill - Method two.  Tru-oil slurry and buff

This is a method I've never seen other people do.  Generally, it is said that you can't slurry and buff a stained surface because you will sand the stain away.  Actually, if you are careful, you can.

This is how I do it:

  • I stain in the normal way
  • I apply a coat of tru-oil and let it fully dry
  • I apply a second coat of tru-oil, applied with 800 or 1000 grit wet and dry (you can also use micro-web) slurrying VERY gently.  The slurry WILL take up some of the stain but the trick is not to go deep enough to expose unstained wood.  Basically you are trying to slurry the first tru-oil coat, not the stained wood 
  • The slurry will fill grain perfectly well.  While still wet (within 10 mins) very gently wipe the slurry off
  • taXtmIPl.jpg
  • Let it dry, then repeat the slurry and wipe
  • Repeat once more then leave as is (hand buffing to satin smoothness once it's properly dry) or add more tru-oil coats for a greater gloss or over-coat with varnish, whichever preferred.

If you don't add the top gloss coats over the slurry and buffed finish, surely the ink will come off on your hands when you play?

Well - it doesn't seem to.  In fact, because I like satin necks, this is how I do all my stained necks nowadays - even for very, very regular players - so far they assure me they've never been caught red handed. xD

Hope this helps

Andy

 

 

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3 minutes ago, T-Bay said:

That is fantastic mate, thanks! As said above, it will be a couple of weeks before I get a go at it again but can’t wait to have a go. It’s getting to the exciting end of the project now!

No problem - we are all waiting enthusiastically to see how it progresses :)

By the way, in case people are inspired to use inks themselves, there are some ranges of colour that seem susceptible to fading and some specific colours that definitely do within those generalisations.

  • Generally, the blues and purples seem to fade the most.  Having said that, the blue/turquoise guitar in the example above still looks the same colour as when I did it in 2014 - and it's been hanging on a wall near the window until very recently!
  • There is an interesting accelerated fade test of the full range of Diamine inks on one of the fountain-pen enthusiasts web sites:  http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/250572-all-diamine-inks-mini-fade-test/
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12 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

No problem - we are all waiting enthusiastically to see how it progresses :)

By the way, in case people are inspired to use inks themselves, there are some ranges of colour that seem susceptible to fading and some specific colours that definitely do within those generalisations.

  • Generally, the blues and purples seem to fade the most.  Having said that, the blue/turquoise guitar in the example above still looks the same colour as when I did it in 2014 - and it's been hanging on a wall near the window until very recently!
  • There is an interesting accelerated fade test of the full range of Diamine inks on one of the fountain-pen enthusiasts web sites:  http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/250572-all-diamine-inks-mini-fade-test/

That link is fascinating, some very similar colours seem to behave very very differently. I would have expected the various shades to be made from a small number of basic colours blended to make the variations but that would appear to suggest that they use a wide variety of ingredients. The colour you suggested seems to be one of the best and thankfully the ones I selected seem good as well.

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  • 2 weeks later...

As mentioned before, time has not been with me the last couple of weeks but I finally got a chance to try out the ink a few minutes ago. @Andyjr1515 I take my hat off to you. It looks fantatstic and goes on so well. I have only done one coat on an offcut but will post up a pic once it’s had it’s extra coats and has been lacquered but suffice to say I am smitten.

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10 minutes ago, T-Bay said:

As mentioned before, time has not been with me the last couple of weeks but I finally got a chance to try out the ink a few minutes ago. @Andyjr1515 I take my hat off to you. It looks fantatstic and goes on so well. I have only done one coat on an offcut but will post up a pic once it’s had it’s extra coats and has been lacquered but suffice to say I am smitten.

Sounds good :)

Looking forward to seeing the results (although be aware that with finishing it sometimes looks worse before it looks better...so, actually, post pics when you're happy to ;) )

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Three coats on, it’s only a small piece of scrap to see how it looks and I am impressed. What has surprised me the most is even me almost throwing it on it’s produced an incredibly even colour. I though it may need a lot of care to get a good coverage but I have just put a bit of ink on a cloth and wiped it over as per Andy’s instruction. The difference compared to the ‘proper’ wood dye could not be more striking. And being so cheap I will try some other colours on my next build (that word next again....). More bits have arrived in the post as well so now only waiting on the screws for the pick guard and I will have everything.

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It’s now had some lacquer (pic below) and I am very very pleased with it. I want to point out that this has been thrown on purely to get an impression of colour. The surface was not prepared in any way, it was a rough piece cut from the original blank. I am a great fan of grain on wood. I appreciate this may sound weird and then begs the question of how much lacquer to use, but I love the feel of a nice grain so I won’t be doing the grain filling parts of Andys technique. The work above is truly gorgeous and it’s work like that which has inspired me to have a go, if it finishes off a tenth as nice I will be happy. 59A4E6E6-22D1-44F9-B148-6C01BD24115D.thumb.jpeg.936cebab1ae80692b7991103efbc45ec.jpegI really want to see the colour of a sunny day before I make the final decision but am 99% sure it will be the one.

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2 hours ago, T-Bay said:

It’s now had some lacquer (pic below) and I am very very pleased with it. I want to point out that this has been thrown on purely to get an impression of colour. The surface was not prepared in any way, it was a rough piece cut from the original blank. I am a great fan of grain on wood. I appreciate this may sound weird and then begs the question of how much lacquer to use, but I love the feel of a nice grain so I won’t be doing the grain filling parts of Andys technique. The work above is truly gorgeous and it’s work like that which has inspired me to have a go, if it finishes off a tenth as nice I will be happy. 59A4E6E6-22D1-44F9-B148-6C01BD24115D.thumb.jpeg.936cebab1ae80692b7991103efbc45ec.jpegI really want to see the colour of a sunny day before I make the final decision but am 99% sure it will be the one.

Looking forward to seeing how this progresses.

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10 hours ago, T-Bay said:

Looks more red in real life.

It's almost impossible to photograph the true colour for reds.  Something to do with the ccd chips in modern cameras I'm told. 

The photos generally lose the burgundy element and come out looking like a much oranger red than the blood red it actually is in real life.  Good guess? ;)

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52 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

It's almost impossible to photograph the true colour for reds.  Something to do with the ccd chips in modern cameras I'm told. 

The photos generally lose the burgundy element and come out looking like a much oranger red than the blood red it actually is in real life.  Good guess? ;)

Absolutely spot on mate.

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More work done, the colour is on as are the first coats of lacquer. The main body looks nice but the edges not so good at the moment. They were very smooth but seem to have roughed up. It’s going off as we speak so I will leave it until tomorrow then flat it off. Hmmmm, we will see. Might me a ‘ten footer’. Tuners are also in. Had a disaster with the decal for the front, I have been waiting for a phone call from the hospital for days, when did it come? Yup, just as the decal went into the water. I couldn’t not take the call and by the time I had finished it must have been half an hour later and it was beyond saving. Not a massive problem but a pain.

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Depending on how many lacquer coats you are going for, leave the flattening of the edges until you've put a decent number of coats on - it's very easy to sand down through the lacquer and take the stain off!

If you do - don't panic.  Remember that if you can see wood colour, then you are actually down to wood and so stain re-applied just in that area will absorb pretty well...

It's looking good - and I know what colour that really is!

Edited by Andyjr1515
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