Anyone that's ever refinished a guitar body...

[Jimothy JP7]

Whats the best or easiest way to get all the scratches from the coarse sanding out? It's hard to tweak the paper around the horns and edges without going against the grain. What process did you use? I started with coarse and a finishing sander and got the clear coat off, now I'm trying to get the body flawless so I can start painting.

Thanks,
Jim

 

[Sub1 Zero]

I did a $quier in traffic cone orange, and it looked like hell. It was my first real experience painting anything, and I just used coarse to remove the paint and then used the finishing one to make things smooth. Try what I did when I buffed horns, cut the sandpaper into strips and and hold one end in each hand and work it back and forth over the surface.

 

[MusicManJP6]

I used steel wool after the smallest grit sand paper to achieve the 'smooth as a baby's bottom' feel before getting it painted... Works wonders. Just work your way down in coarseness until you are using like 0000 (ultra fine) steel wool...

 

[uvacom]

Yup, just use progressively finer sandpaper, and then steel wool or alternately, scotchbrite. It also helps to use a backing, you might find that wrapping the sandpaper (or preferably even gluing) to a nice stiff sponge can make it much easier to sand around the contours without the sandpaper buckling up and such.

 

[candid_x]

I used paint remover, then medium to fine sandpaper and steel wool. But that was before these new 'tough as nails' poly finishes. Not sure if paint remover will lift that stuff. Anyone know?

 

[Jimothy JP7]

Candid, I tried it on an Ibanez body, and it took forever. After I'd done it I realized it was just easier to do it by hand.

Thanks everybody, I'll post some pics of it as soon as I'm done.

 

[Quarter]

A heat gun works great for stripping poly, just keep the heat moving to be careful not to scorch it.

 

[koogie2k]

Whats the best or easiest way to get all the scratches from the coarse sanding out? It's hard to tweak the paper around the horns and edges without going against the grain. What process did you use? I started with coarse and a finishing sander and got the clear coat off, now I'm trying to get the body flawless so I can start painting.

Thanks,
Jim

I have never done a re-finish before. However, Cudbucket on the forum here has built a guitar by hand. Pete has re-finished a JP. Hope they chime in for you to offer their advice. Cud and Pete's guitars were AWESOME. I got much respect for Cud's woodworking (amongst other things).....that guitar he made was great....he also made some speaker cabs if I remember.

 

[passarellee]

I refinished this Squier Custom II.
It was black and had two P90's (bad ones




I sanded it by hand and that took some hours of hard, and i mean very hard work

I just sanded as smooth as i could but not mirror like because at his point in is not neccesary yet imo. That part comes when you are done painting.

I used an airbrush for the red and black and stain for the middle 'amber' color, then i used nitrocellulose for the clearcoats and this is where you want things to get smoother after every coat.
I sprayed 1 coat every day and fine sanded after 3 coats. With a total of let's say 12 to 15 coats of clear you should have a nice flat surface, ready to buff out to have a mirrorlike finish

good luck,

 

[Tim O'Sullivan]

I am no expert, but I think you should be using some kind of grain filler before you paint it.

 

[andynpeters]

Sent you a PM with a useful website Jimothy

 

[Jimothy JP7]

Thanks for all the help everyone. I used some Plastic Wood from my local hardware store to fill in all the dings and such, and I'm just about done sanding. Right now I'm about to go outside and take some steel wool to the body to eliminate and scratches from going against the grain and stuff like that. Up here in MD the weather has been ridiculous [70 and 80 one day, snowing the next], so I don't know when I'm going to have a few straight nice days to do some painting, but I will post some progress pics.

-Jim

 

[Sub1 Zero]

Weather has been like that here also. Was out last night around midnight and it started snowing... in APRIL!!!

 

[jagged]

It's been a solid -10Celcius here for the last 3 weeks or so

 

[Jimothy JP7]

OOooo, glad I'm not in good ole Canadia right now. I'm sure you'd find MD nice and warm today. It's about 70 today with a small breeze, a little too much breeze to paint, but not too much to make one uncomfortable. On the flip side, the forecast is calling for a "wintery" mix Sunday and snow on Monday.


Therefore, Tuesday it's bound to be 95 around noon, flash floods for dinner and a 4 foot thick sheet of ice will fall at 8:30 and smash the east coast.

 

[PugNinjas]

Man, all you guys talking about refinishing guitars and having fun while I spent the day steam cleaning the carpets.

 

[PugNinjas]

The sanding tips are right on the money, and like Kookie pointed out Cud did an amazing build from scratch. Project Guitar.com has a plethora of info and plenty of folks will to help out and answer any questions you may have...good luck

 

[Tim O'Sullivan]

Man, all you guys talking about refinishing guitars and having fun while I spent the day steam cleaning the carpets.

Being rock and roll as I am, I just cleaned the bathroom.

 

[andynpeters]

Being rock and roll as I am, I just cleaned the bathroom.

You say!!! Where are the pics??