I have learned a lot over the last few days; things such as how not to paint a guitar, how to remove paints of different kinds and how many different kinds of paints there are, and how sharp putty knives really are.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I’ve had my headstock sanded and ready to be painted for quite some time. So I started painting. I took a brush, some primer, and some paint and started on my way. It took 2 coats to realize that a brush was not going to work well. It left brush stroke patterns and textures that would definitely not look nice at all. Luckily, it was water based paint and it all came off fairly easily. So next day, I went to RONA to pick up some spray paint. IMPORTANT: know what types of paints you’re going to need before you go shopping. I purchased some red and some white enamel paint cans. So I went home and sprayed the base layer of white on. After reading up on some guitar painting tips, I realized I needed lacquer paints, not enamels. So off to Home Depot this time to pick up primer, red, white, and black lacquer paints and some paint stripper. After coming home and masking off my desired stripe area, I started to spray paint the new red lacquer paint on. IMPORTANT: do not mix different types of paints. When I took the mask off, the paint had bled underneath the mask. So I was forced to re-sand the guitar back to its bare-wood state. I went back to the Internet to find more painting help and I came across a great website: www.paintyourownguitar.com*. From here, I learned what I needed to do. So my headstock is currently sitting in my basement with its first coat of primer on and that’s the story of my headstock.

The next story I have to share is my guitar body story. I went out and got my body back because I decided I wanted to do the paint job. So what does it take to paint a guitar body? The first thing I knew I had to do was take off the paint layer that was already on the guitar. That’s what the paint stripper was for. I applied the paint stripper and began peeling away at the paint with a putty scraper. It has taken quite a bit of time and effort to get to the wood layer; however I know I have saved a lot of sanding time. I still have half of the paint to get rid of, but I am much farther now than I thought I’d be after one day. I am modelling my guitar after a Ron Fellows Custom PRS guitar and so I am very excited to see how well I can match the paint scheme.

LINK TO PICTURE

As I was scraping some of the paint off today, I accidentally stabbed myself with the putty knife. Though it is common sense (that I seemed to have forgotten for one stroke), make sure you always scrape away from your body and HANDS or any other body part that might be touching the guitar.

One last change in plans that I have decided on is a change of pickups. For one, I figured if I want to work in the electrical field, I probably shouldn’t buy a prewired pickup set. That just ruins the fun. I was also iffy on buying a set of EMGs because my other guitar already has them, though I have never heard EMG’s single coil pickups. Yes, I still recommend EMGs for any guitar; however I want to test out different pickup brands for this guitar. Instead, I chose Seymour Duncan pickups. I am purchasing an SH-6 Distortion humbucker for the bridge, an SSL-1 Vintage Staggered single-coil for the middle, and an SHR-1 Hot Rail Stacked single-coil pickup for the neck position. These pickups look pretty sweet.

I will be doing follow up entries about the painting process (with pictures), as well as the pickups and their installation as the processes take place. I will also have some new pictures up very shortly. It’s almost time!

-- Mike


*Note: www.paintyourownguitar.com does not tell you how to paint a guitar. He sells many books that help you along the way. If you, like me, are extremely broke and cannot buy the book at the time, sign up for his newsletter and read through the tips he gives. Many of these tips will help you as they have helped me.

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