Finish progress pics

Monday, March 13, 2006

These pics were taken after my 3rd coat of varnish. I am using Tru-Oil gunstock finish, which you can get in the sporting goods section of Wal-Mart. If you search the web, you should be able to find plenty of info supporting the use of Tru-Oil as an instrument finish. The top is a little blotchier than I had hoped it would be, but I knew it would be somewhat. With no sealer coat, the spruce top soaked up the varnish like a sponge, and got dark in some areas. I think when I'm done, it will just give it an antique effect, which I consider nice. Before I do anymore coats, I need to level the finish with some fine sandpaper. You can see in the pics that there are brush marks and other types of marks that need to be smoothed out. I was just a little scared of doing that before getting a couple coats on, because of the stories I've heard about "burning through" which means sanding through to the stain or dye, and messing it up. This is very difficult to fix with a sunburst. Hopefully it will be ok that I didn't do any sanding inbetween coats, I'll find out soon enough. I did at least rough up the surface with some 0000 steel wool before putting on my 2nd and 3rd coat. And I did put on thin coats, wiping off the excess with a soft rag. Also, I am planning on doing a shellac topcoat, I'll write more about that later.