thought you guys might get a kick out of this creation . a few years back I got inspired to pick up the electric guitar again after hearing stormy Monday by the allmans driving home one late night. of course I would need a " dark burst" just like duane so lo and behold I found an Epiphone PLus top on ebay, tobacco burst with black back and neck with Duncan ? blues?" pickups. the burst painting was very heavy handed leaving just an amber circle in the middle of the guitar. the price was right so I got it.
played and sounded ok but felt kind of dead and really heavy and had a really thick finish on it . so I got the idea to strip it and spray my own burst, easy right? I am pretty happy playing about any guitar but it seems true that while the cheap ones look fine the stuff you don't see is not that great, . stripping the finish was not easy using a heat gun and some chemical remover I got some areas to peel off, thick and super tough could be used as skid plate under a car probably, what seemed to be a flame veneer on the top was actually a tissue thin layer of veneer air brushed to simulate flame. the back and sides had a "similar 'mahogany" layer. ended up sanding everything off with a belt sander and 60 grit paper. the neck which was painted black originally actually had a scarf joint in the upper third!! all good except the body of the guitar is some type of nondescript softwood (maybe luan?) that has a bunch of knots on the front too deep to sand off.
so I say what the hell this is gonna be real vintage so stained the back and neck using some cherry stain and using a can of amber and a can of red nitro spray paint from stew mac painted it up , the burst pattern is decent but the amber which looks really orange combined with the red is really bright like a freshly poured teguilla sunrise and does not cover the knots at all. I decide to spray the whole thing red but of course the nitro pain is pretty translucent so all the knots are visible. I decided I could live with the knots and sprayed a few coats of nitro clear and wet sanded, reassembled , it is about 2 pounds lighter!
so it went back on the wall to be played on a regular basis , sounds and plays fine for me.
Drinking a nice coconut brown ale the other night and noticed that the label is a high quality decal that can be peeled off, loved the rasta iguana playing the bongos and got the idea " I wonder if this would cover the knots " . ended up with this .
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