Official Luthiers Forum!

I know this has been covered a thousand times but i really am confused.

This is my first SM 000 build

I have final sanded the body and I have bought some z-poxy finishing resin.

I intend to z-poxy the mahog back and sides and shellac the sitka top and leave it at that as i have no spraying facility. Is this OK?

More importantly can some one please highlight (or point to a resource) for me a step by step guide to applying both the shellac to the top and the z-poxy to the back and sides?o

The kind of quetsions that I have are as follows:

I intend to use an old CC to simply squeegee the z-poxy on.

How many coats
How long between coats
How much sanding between coats
How do i know when i have sanded enough between each coat
What grade of sand paper should i use
What do i use to apply the shellac to the top
Do I apply more thasn one coat
If so do i sand between coats etc etc

Any help as always very much appreciated.


All the best
Barry

Thanks guys
Barry

See I come at it from a different angle. To me the Z-poxy is purely a pore filler, nothing more. So, I apply it in exactly the same way as described above, using a credit card, then I sand back to bare wood so that the Z-poxy is just left in the pores of the wood, but not on the overall surface. Then I French polish the whole guitar. I want shellac on my wood not epoxy resin. In fact I'm seriously considering going back to pumice filling. Don't get me wrong I think Z-poxy is a great pore filler, but I'm not so sure about it as the base coat for a finish, which I want as thin as possible. I know people talk about it 'popping' the grain, but so does shellac. In 50 years or so we might have the data to decide on it as a sub-base for the finish, but I'll let others run the experiment thankyou.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

By the way Berry; Hesh has got it down to a science

How does one apply shellac.
I have used it before under instruction from Dave White to simply 'protect' the sitka from pulling under the binding tape. In thi case i just ragged it on but i guess whenn applying it as a finish one should use something better (muneca)???

Barry

Barry, a great mystique has built up around French polishing, but when it boils down to it you are just rubbing diluted shellac onto the wood, everything else is refinement. I've FP'd 30 or so guitars and now realise that what scared me first off is just the idea rather than the execution.

My advice would be to print off the method from the Milburn site and follow their guidlines closely as a starting point. You won't want the spit coating or pumicing sections, start at the muneca.

Millburn FP guide

For shellac just go onto Axminster's site (should be bookmarked as your favourite site!) and get a small bottle of this Liberon Special Pale French Polish, it's de-waxed and ready to use. then you'll just need some alcohol, in our case Methylated spirits and also steal a bit of the Olive Oil or my preference walnut oil from the kitchen and you are ready to go.
Axminster

I've guided several people successfully through their first French polish and each has wondered what the fuss was all about when they had done.

PM me if you want me to talk you through it a bit more.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

The solution to that would be to become an ambidextrous French Polisher - Wipe on - Wipe off process to keep one from having to buy custom made shirts. 

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Todd - Stunning guitars. I know there are flashier woods out there, but mahogany is really beautiful in an elegant, understated way.

Barry - One mistake I made when first starting to FP was that I used too much shellac on my pad. Go easy (6-8 drops) and work up to a film slowly. However, I've only done three, so listen to Colin.

I agree with Colin as well on the approach to the use of Z-Poxy. I have tried it a number of ways in the past and have decided that sanding back to the natural wood leaving only the pores filled works best for me. I do use a 50/50 mix at this point in the process to pop the grain and even things out after sanding to 320. I have not tried shellac at this juncture as my base coat as Colin suggests, but I am going to give it a try on my next. I like to let the guitar sit for at least 1 week before I start applying finish.

Mike

As ever amazing help and advice.....

I will start wil the z-poxy tonight on the back and sides.
I will then shellac the top back and sides.

I didnt really want to FP the guitar (effort and durability reasons)

I mearly wanted to fill the hardwood poors and then protect the whole thing as best as possible without getting to deep into finishing (at this point as it ismy first)

I have some Liberon from Axminster (Dave White advice again :))

I guess FP is very similar to polishing (spit and polish) my parade boots/shoes when i was a cadet in the ATC. My shoes were like glass then so maybe i will FP the guitar after all.

Polish on polish off for even arms tho LOL

Thanks all
B

pores even

You can get a pretty nice finish with Shellac by spraying, but I guess it may not be as durable as FP, nor as thin.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Barry - I'm not sure your approach will make you happy. It sounds like you'll end up with a half-finished guitar that will look like you took a half-fast approach. You'll then have to explain to everyone who looks at your first guitar that you really intended to do it that way.

If you just want to protect the wood and then get on with playing (and building the next), I'd recommend that you just wipe on a few coats of Tru-Oil.

Snood, this is a great thread. Thanks for starting it.

I filled my guitar with Z-Poxy last week. My mornings are filled until later
this week, but I plan on doing a few gap filling experiments then
beginning to brush on Behlen's Rockhard Tabletop Varnish, mixed per Al
Carruth's description here:

http://luthiersforum.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?
TID=2968&KW=walker+finish#forumTop

Hi Bruce and thanks for the advice
Would i still want to fill the hardwood pores though?

Thanks James.
Hey you look like a surfer ther :)

Thanks to everyone I think I will PM Colin and get this one right. Treat it a a lesson build throughout.

Patience Barry patience

[QUOTE=snood]
Patience Barry patience

[/QUOTE]

I think that's the hardest part.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

[QUOTE=snood] Would i still want to fill the hardwood pores though?
[/QUOTE]

Only if you want to.

But yeah, if you want to learn patience, finishing is a good way to do it. I'm still learning patience.

[QUOTE=Hesh1956]
Recently I tried using my high-tech finger in a rubber glove to rub the Z-
poxy into the neck and it worked GREAT!!! It was the best neck fill that I
ever did and only took one coat.
[/QUOTE]

Hesh, I just tried that myself last week. It works great for the sides of an
electric too.

_________________
Mike

"The Dude abides. I don't know about you but I take comfort in that. It's good knowin' he's out there. The Dude. Takin' 'er easy for all us sinners. Shoosh." The Stranger

Am I understanding correctly that you would not want to use Z-Poxy on the Top? I know that the top doesn't have the open pores to fill, but it seems that somewhere (unless I just dreamt it up), that people Z-Poxy the top as well...

Snood, thanks for starting this post. I'm about to start FPing my first as well, so this is a great read!

_________________
Thanks,
Blain

http://www.ullrichguitar.com

"89.67% of all statistics are made up on the spot."

You do not need to pore fill the top as sitka does not have open pores.
I am not sure why some do i guess some will say it adds tone others will say not............a very dark and murky area IMHO
I will not be using a pore filler on my top BTW

I am probably going to do
z-poxy back and sides
shellac on the top (one or two coats but not FP)
Then tru-oil all over
I like the satin finish way better than the gloss anyway.........too much IMHO but obviously a lot of people really like it.

Hey these are our 1st attempts so its ok to experiment i guess


Barry

Wow! I have not posted on this topic in a while and when I do it is typically on French polishing issues. However many have already stated my process for FP with Zpoxy fill. So what I will say now pertains to Zpoxy fill and sprayed finishes.

Like many of the others have said I fill via Zpoxy, sand back to the wood leaving on the pores filled. I then wipe a 60/40 mix Zpoxy/ DA on with lint free pad to even coloration. I allow this to cure and level just ever so lightly with 400p. This is more a tooth than leveling. Then I spray a 1.5# cut of shellac as a sealer for the whole guitar. Less the fb of course. I allow this thin seal coat to cure over night the repeat. This ins my seal process for all my sprayed finishes.


As usual many are scared of epoxy and shellac combination. If the shellac is over the epoxy there will be no issue. However if you put epoxy over shellac the epoxy till flake off. Shellac will adhere to near any thing but epoxy will not adhere to shellac well at all.