Official Luthiers Forum!

As much as I love natural wood, and sunbursts, seeing Hesh's black-top guitar every time I browse the OLF makes me curious. How'd you get the color on there? What about the rosette? Is it a clear finish over a stained top?

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Gabriel Regalbuto
Carlsbad, California
Freedom 35!

Had I known he was gonna do that.......

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Canada

OY VEY! Here we go again!

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Billy Dean Thomas
Covina, CA

"Multi famam, conscientiam, pauci verentur."
(Many fear their reputation, few their conscience)

Actually its black spruce !!!!

Here is how I would have done that. Spray 3-4 clear base coats, then flat sand, and mask off the rosette and binding. Spray black. Remove mask and continue with clear.

Something else that may work - once the binding ledges are cut, stain the whole top with the rosette masked. Might work.

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

Gabriel, I described what I did on my black-topped archtop viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=15583&hilit=
a while back, which may help. (I'm not sure what Hesh had done on his - PM'd him before I did mine but never got a response.)

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Dave
Milton, ON

I'm actually looking to do a lime-green top which I think will really compliment this nice set of Brazillian. Don't worry Shane, I'll save my HighMountain order for the hot pink axe I'm gonna make my daughter. Black is depressing, no? How about one of those two-tone jobs?

In all seriousness, I'd love to see Hesh's method. Hey Hesh, you've got the some of the best of tutorials out there (no confusing sawdust or scattered tools in the background), how about it?

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Gabriel Regalbuto
Carlsbad, California
Freedom 35!

Hi Gabe!

Sorry for the delay in replying to you my friend I have been moving, in the home sense..... I just sat down because I CAN'T TAKE ANYMORE OF THESE STINKIN BOXES!!!!! Sorry for yelling......

OK - Lime green eh...... But you know some BRW has green it and this actually may look very cool.

Here is how the Black Tiger was done. First the bindings are ebony and are not painted. You can only see this in direct sunlight. One of the design goals was to make the L-OO look like it had an electrics drop-top at about 1/4" thick.

So..... no purfs were used either and Tony Ferguson who did a masterful job on the Black Tiger finish masked the top just barely overlapping the bindings from the top perspective. In addition the back, where the sides meet, was bound in Tiger Myrtle also to understate the bindings since the Tiger is such ans eye catcher and with a black top I was looking to understate where ever possible.

I believe that Tony sprayed black cat urethane on the top and then a coat of clear which meant that the second coat on the guitar was all clear everywhere. The Tiger rosette with purfs was masked for the first/black coat.

I hope this helps and be sure to show us the Green Hornet that results.