Official Luthiers Forum!

It's been awhile since I've French polished a guitar. I've read aboutRoyal Lac but have never used it.
For anyone who has experience with it, what's the current verdict on this?

Thumbs up from me. There are two versions: original and post catalyzed. Both are great, but have different characteristics and peculiarities. You can French polish with original, but not with post catalyzed. You can pad on post catalyzed, but you can’t do traditional style French polishing, with the oil, etc. Pay attention to cure time, and add more. Both versions do better when you let them cure longer than the minimum.

I have french polished with RoyalLac. It works well. Some things I have noticed:

It seems to want a bit more oil while polishing that regular shellac. Take that with a grain of salt. It seems like, with french polish in general, each person's experience and approach are a little bit different. Just try it out and figure out what is working for you and don't be surprised if you end up using more oil, rather than just starting with more oil than you usually would. Work up to it and find what is working for you,

You really do need to do a couple seal coats with regular shellac first. Royal Lac sells a seal coat which is really just shellac, any good shellac will work. When I first was starting to use Royal Lac, Veejay told me to seal with regular shellac first. That sounded kind of silly and I originally did not bother. I soon learned that it was needed. This was years and years ago so I can't exactly remember what happened when I didn't seal first. I seem to remember gene3rally having difficulties getting it to build with the FP style of application but pulling it off with alcohol and then sealing with regular shellac cured it, so just go ahead and seal. . .

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I use the standard Royal Lac. I put it on with fad with some alcohol and a touch of walnut oil. Check out Robbie O'brian's video and also there's a video showing an English luthier (Simon?) doing a guitar.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Bryan, you hit upon the biggest problem of RL, at least for me. Like you, I found that I was using way more oil. And it was staying in the finish. Spiriting off had no effect. Padded RL with no oil sands beautifully. After French polishing with oil it was impossible to sand. It gummed up the sandpaper almost immediately.
When I tried it out about 10 years ago the MSDS listed diacetone alcohol as one of the components. The oils commonly used in French polishing are soluble in diacetone alcohol. The same oils are insoluble in ethanol.
He may have changed his formula since then. My experience with it as well as a friend's was not positive.
I'm not trying to sink Vijay's business. I just believe RL's suitability for various projects is more limited than as represented.

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Stay with the happy people.
--Reynolds Large

Interesting Tom. I can say that I never really noticed oil staying in the finish but I also don't think I did much sanding of it either. It will be a while before I am dong any FP again but I'll pay attention and see what I notice.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

No oil issues here but I do little or no sanding after FP, it’s not needed (for me anyway).

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I have French polished with the original version of Royal Lac, using olive oil as a lubricant, and it worked fine. It felt more gummy than regular shellac as I was applying it, but it went on fine. I had no issues with the final result.

With post catalyzed, I sprayed it. The finish came out really, really nice.

In the future, if I use it again, I will use post catalyzed and probably pad it on with no oil. That’s not French polishing, but it is a simple hand method that is close enough for me.

My personal question mark about using Royal Lac in the future is no reflection on the finish. I’m just focusing on UV cured finishes right now. As solvent finishes go, Royal Lac post catalyzed is probably my favorite.

Interesting Tom. I can say that I never really noticed oil staying in the finish but I also don't think I did much sanding of it either. It will be a while before I am dong any FP again but I'll pay attention and see what I notice.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I have a guitar I FP'd with Royal Lac and walnut oil 10+ years ago and it's fine as far as oil goes. Nothing unusual to note in that regard. It was the guitar I learned to FP on, so the finish isn't amazing, but that's due to the user, not the product.

I've sprayed polyester, nitro, and post-cat Royal Lac. As far as spraying goes, the post cat RL was by far the best finishing experience I've had. It went on easily, but also had a very "friendly" cure as far as off-gassing and all that goes. Super easy stuff to work with.