I know I'm late to the party with comments but this was EXACTLY what I was looking for. I usually use shellac or lacquer but I decided to do an oil/poly finish on my latest guitar and was having all kind of trouble getting the final look I wanted. Thanks for the info Chris, you saved the day for me on this project.
Chris, you give so many options of finishing that I’ve come to realize there’s no perfect one but just the one that fits that piece for me. It’s so much easier when people on TH-cam give absolutes but I now understand many of the absolutes I see on are just suggestions or personal biases.Keep it up. You help me question the absolutes and begin to understand the biases. Great job.
Glad you mentioned the correct disposal once more. It's often underestimated. With 3 individual containers for the mineral spirits, there is no contamination possible from one grit to the other. Looking forward to see all the hardware installed.
I normally don't worry too much about cross-contamination between grits when sanding oil finishes. However, I use separate containers when wet sanding high gloss clear coats for sure.
would this technique work with hard wax oils? i am just finishing two bodies with Osmo oil which is similar to Odies oil, and im curious about wet sanding with mineral spirits. I was planning to try with water until i saw this. Thanks! love the flip flop trick, definitely using that!
I'm glad I found a video showing you working with Danish oil. I've also seen your video on grain filling, so this is probably a dumb question: I plan to finish an ash guitar body with Danish oil -- do I need to use grain filler first, or does the Danish oil act as a grain filler as it's absorbed into the wood?
thank you . question please have u used tung oil as a finish before ?i have had good luck with it on furniture before i was wondering how it would work on an acoustic guitar ? thank you
Hi Chris, I am working on a guitar that will have a spalted maple top (1/4" thick). The wood is pretty brittle and I was hoping you might have some advice on how to treat the wood so that I don't have to worry as much about tear out when routing pickup cavities, neck pocket and binding channel. I may have jumped the gun but I have already glued the top to the mahogany body blank. Nothing is cut yet so I have a blank that is about 13"x24". Any advice would be appreciated and always love your videos, they really do help a lot.
The proper way is to have the boards acrylic stabilized. However, this is not something you can easily do yourself as it requires special equipment. You could send it to someone who can do it for you, but at that size, it would be expensive. An alternative is to flood the surface with water thin CA glue to harden the wood. CA glue is nasty stuff to work with and masks don't do much to help. You have to keep flooding the surface until the glue stops soaking in. Unfortunately, it can take a lot of glue which isn't cheap. This is why I rarely use spalted Maple. It's a PITA!
@@HighlineGuitars Thanks Chris. As always your advice and help is greatly appreciated. Do you think flooding with epoxy resin would work or just stick with CA glue?
I've been looking at a lot of finishing videos while figuring what will work for my rather crude project. And I usually drop a tip that I picked up. Maybe someone could test it to see if it works as good as I think it does. So, here is the tip. Take a bun of 0000 steel wool, and unroll it. Take it outside, and holding it at one end, like on a screwdriver. Light the bottom and let it burn all the way up until only a few embers may still be alive. Pat it so all burning is out. Inspect the now gray mass for shiny threads. Those didn't burn because they were too thick, and would only scratch your finish. Pull them out. Re-roll the bun which is now VERY fine, soft. dull gray. Compare a finish done with this, against other final methods.
Thank you. My only issue with this is, how can I crank out guitars if I have to wait days for them to dry. I'd have to use some sort of oven to dry them faster I gather?
Sanding with mineral spirits, won't that thin the finish? I am confused. I want to sand my neck which I applied Boiled linseed oil to. Can I apply the same technique. 400-800-1500 grits?
I used paint thinner to make wipe on poly for two guitar bodies. would it be ok to use the paint thinner instead of mineral spirits for wet sanding. Under the poly is water based stain
@@HighlineGuitars just want to lightly sand yo make sure its flat as can be so it looks good when i polish...was going to just use 1500 grit a little and then polish
I thought you couldn’t use a varnish over an oil? Is that ok because of the danish oil it because of the wipe on poly? Ie would this work with say truoil?
The only oils you shouldn't put varnish over is pure tung oil and raw linseed oil. Those oils never dry. Boiled linseed oil and polymerized tung oil can be varnished over as long as the oil has thoroughly cured.
I've done a spray on satin poly over tru oil before. Definitely works, just be sure to let the tru-oil sit long enough for the surface to cure, at least 3 days if not more than a week. It's ok if you seal it in before the truoil entirely cures (which some people say can take weeks to months), because you only do one heavy coat (and wipe off the excess after 10 minutes), so 99% of the oil is down in the wood anyways. I have also done a coat of shellac between the truoil and the poly, which was recommend to me on a forum (can't remember which one), and that worked well also. Still needed to let the tru-oil set for a couple of days though.
I know I'm late to the party with comments but this was EXACTLY what I was looking for. I usually use shellac or lacquer but I decided to do an oil/poly finish on my latest guitar and was having all kind of trouble getting the final look I wanted. Thanks for the info Chris, you saved the day for me on this project.
Chris, you give so many options of finishing that I’ve come to realize there’s no perfect one but just the one that fits that piece for me. It’s so much easier when people on TH-cam give absolutes but I now understand many of the absolutes I see on are just suggestions or personal biases.Keep it up. You help me question the absolutes and begin to understand the biases.
Great job.
Superb video Chris. One of the finest contributors to YT. Appreciate you sharing your experience and expertise.
Glad you mentioned the correct disposal once more. It's often underestimated.
With 3 individual containers for the mineral spirits, there is no contamination possible from one grit to the other.
Looking forward to see all the hardware installed.
I normally don't worry too much about cross-contamination between grits when sanding oil finishes. However, I use separate containers when wet sanding high gloss clear coats for sure.
And one other thing, took your advice on using tung oil on the neck and man is it looking good 🤘
What are your thoughts on wet sanding with Danish oil as the first step?
Thanks for keeping us informed about all the guitar making stuff. Could I also put tung oil in the neck pocket?
Yes, absolutely.
About how many coats of the wop do you recommend? And should it dry a few days before wet-sanding?
Thanks for all the tutorials Chris :)
Great video, One question. How many coats of the oil and fast dry poly mixture did you put on before you started wet sanding?
I'm a simple man. I see a Highline video, I watch it.
would this technique work with hard wax oils? i am just finishing two bodies with Osmo oil which is similar to Odies oil, and im curious about wet sanding with mineral spirits. I was planning to try with water until i saw this. Thanks! love the flip flop trick, definitely using that!
I don't know. I don't use those products.
Dude, I love your videos!
Glad you like them!
both interesting and useful - thanks for sharing your knowledge!
I'm glad I found a video showing you working with Danish oil. I've also seen your video on grain filling, so this is probably a dumb question: I plan to finish an ash guitar body with Danish oil -- do I need to use grain filler first, or does the Danish oil act as a grain filler as it's absorbed into the wood?
You only need to use filler if you don't want to feel the grain texture.
@@HighlineGuitars Thanks for the quick answer! To make sure I understand, it will still soak up Danish oil normally even after the grain filler?
Chris, have you ever applied TruOil over the Danish Oil? And subsequently wet sanded?
Nope.
thank you . question please have u used tung oil as a finish before ?i have had good luck with it on furniture before i was wondering how it would work on an acoustic guitar ? thank you
Good advice and demo. Would you consider putting plans for this design on eguitarplans?
I got zippo lighter fluid. Is this the same as mineral spirits?
Hi Chris, I am working on a guitar that will have a spalted maple top (1/4" thick). The wood is pretty brittle and I was hoping you might have some advice on how to treat the wood so that I don't have to worry as much about tear out when routing pickup cavities, neck pocket and binding channel. I may have jumped the gun but I have already glued the top to the mahogany body blank. Nothing is cut yet so I have a blank that is about 13"x24". Any advice would be appreciated and always love your videos, they really do help a lot.
The proper way is to have the boards acrylic stabilized. However, this is not something you can easily do yourself as it requires special equipment. You could send it to someone who can do it for you, but at that size, it would be expensive. An alternative is to flood the surface with water thin CA glue to harden the wood. CA glue is nasty stuff to work with and masks don't do much to help. You have to keep flooding the surface until the glue stops soaking in. Unfortunately, it can take a lot of glue which isn't cheap. This is why I rarely use spalted Maple. It's a PITA!
@@HighlineGuitars Thanks Chris. As always your advice and help is greatly appreciated. Do you think flooding with epoxy resin would work or just stick with CA glue?
I've been looking at a lot of finishing videos while figuring what will work for my rather crude project. And I usually drop a tip that I picked up. Maybe someone could test it to see if it works as good as I think it does. So, here is the tip.
Take a bun of 0000 steel wool, and unroll it. Take it outside, and holding it at one end, like on a screwdriver.
Light the bottom and let it burn all the way up until only a few embers may still be alive. Pat it so all burning is out.
Inspect the now gray mass for shiny threads. Those didn't burn because they were too thick, and would only scratch your finish. Pull them out.
Re-roll the bun which is now VERY fine, soft. dull gray. Compare a finish done with this, against other final methods.
Or better yet, use a high quality synthetic pad.
Thank you. My only issue with this is, how can I crank out guitars if I have to wait days for them to dry. I'd have to use some sort of oven to dry them faster I gather?
Strategic Thinker i wouldn’t rush the process. i’m sure proper customers would understand that quality of work
Sanding with mineral spirits, won't that thin the finish? I am confused. I want to sand my neck which I applied Boiled linseed oil to. Can I apply the same technique. 400-800-1500 grits?
Yes to both of your questions.
@@HighlineGuitars thanks❤️
Thank you for this tip. Good instruction video
Chris, Is there any problem with wet sanding on a veneer? Thanks, Mark
Probably. I wouldn’t know because I have never used a veneer.
I'd love to do that on the bass i'm building, but i stained the wood and i'm afraid i sand of the color. Do you have any tips on that?
You can’t do this technique.
I used paint thinner to make wipe on poly for two guitar bodies. would it be ok to use the paint thinner instead of mineral spirits for wet sanding. Under the poly is water based stain
If you try to sand wet or dry, you’ll likely sand into the stain.
@@HighlineGuitars just want to lightly sand yo make sure its flat as can be so it looks good when i polish...was going to just use 1500 grit a little and then polish
Can you do this finish when you use a water based dye ?
Yes, but I would fix the dye with a light coat of rattle can shellac first.
@@HighlineGuitars Thank you! After a few practice pieces I am ready to start my first finish this weekend.
I thought you couldn’t use a varnish over an oil? Is that ok because of the danish oil it because of the wipe on poly? Ie would this work with say truoil?
The only oils you shouldn't put varnish over is pure tung oil and raw linseed oil. Those oils never dry. Boiled linseed oil and polymerized tung oil can be varnished over as long as the oil has thoroughly cured.
I've done a spray on satin poly over tru oil before. Definitely works, just be sure to let the tru-oil sit long enough for the surface to cure, at least 3 days if not more than a week. It's ok if you seal it in before the truoil entirely cures (which some people say can take weeks to months), because you only do one heavy coat (and wipe off the excess after 10 minutes), so 99% of the oil is down in the wood anyways. I have also done a coat of shellac between the truoil and the poly, which was recommend to me on a forum (can't remember which one), and that worked well also. Still needed to let the tru-oil set for a couple of days though.
It's that Walnut?
With all due respect I will be wet sanding with water and not mineral spirits. Peace.
Be careful, wet sanding with water can cause wood to swell, even if it has been thoroughly sealed with paint and clear coats.
Don't worry...I'm in good company.@@HighlineGuitars