Stains/Varnish/Paints

AcousticMonster

AcousticMonster

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Hi Guys,

I'm going to be building a couple of those Grizzly kits. I'm assuming I will need to either paint or stain the wood, then cover/finish it with a varnish. What paints, stains, and varnish work best for ukes?

Since these are soprano sized kits, I don't want to loose too much of the tone after finishing them.

Thanks.
 
Last edited:
Tenor kit, really? I thought Grizzly only made a soprano kit.
 
I'm about to start in on finishing my first kit (StewMac), and have decided to go with Tru-Oil... it's a pretty straight-forward process that can yield beautiful results.

LMI has great instructions for Tru-Oil application found here.

If I had a shop/garage/basement (something other than my dining room), I'd maybe go with a spray finish, but I'm excited to try Tru-Oil.

StewMac sells a book called "Guitar Finishing Step-By-Step", which might be of some use to you... but the web is full of tons of helpful information.

Good luck and please share your results!

john
 
Willaim King's explanation is the best. It's on his website. LMII's advice is product driven, wordy and overly complicated. William's is simple!

Edit
I have not been able to find any good stuff on YouTube...
 
Last edited:
No I don't - it's in his archives but he has access restrictions. I'll try and have a go now...
 
I have done quite a few guitars and a couple of things to ponder. Be cautious of Tru Oil as a small amount and lots of layers are needed. Nice finish but be careful as you could flood the wood. I use nitro celloluse lacquer in cans or spray from Stew Mac. The KTM product, water base lacquer from LMI, is awesome. Follow the chart in Stew Mac or get the book by Erlewine. If magogany grain fill and decide if you want a translucent color, a dye, or not. I like to dye wood. Cool colors and very nice grain. As before follow instructions and the results are worth it during buff out. Also do a search for Guitar ReRanch. This is a dedicated guitar finishing site. More info than you can shake a Uke at.
Much luck as this is an addicting fun worthwhile process.
Robert from PDX town
 
Color mahogany with a chemical dye straight to the wood - 10% dilution in water of potassium dichromate. It's cheap and it gives it that classic deep blood red look!
 
As I have been looking to duplicate that way cool ES335 Gibson look does the Dichromium Phosphate give that color?? I have done a mahogany electric with colored filler and a diluted Red dye and it was very close.
Thanks all,
Robert
 
Well guys, I finally got one of two Grizzly kits put together. I went with a oil based varnish for the first one. It looks pretty good, but I tried brushing it on - so it's probably not the best finish job ever.

I'll try another approach on my second kit.
 
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