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Hi all.

Starting my third scratch built guitar which is for a friend so I am hoping to up my game. It will be a 12 fret nick Lucas style in flame maple and Austrian spruce. I've so far only used tru oil without pore filling and have been really pleased with the results.

My friend wants a tobacco burst and i want to try front and back bursts. My plan is either to seal with a spray of shellac and then spray tinted shellac until I am happy with the burst, allow to dry and then apply clear tru oil by hand or to do the same process but using tinted tru oil thinned to be able to spray it.

I don't really enjoy or feel confident spraying but I had a try with my friends small spray gun and feel reasonably confident I can get a burst I'm happy with. I would rather do the rest of the finish by hand as I'm confident that I can do it and I don't have to borrow a gun for the whole process.

Should I use some dye on the bare maple and then sand back to bring up the grain?

Any tips/advice/experience appreciated.

I'm ideally wanting a thirties nick Lucas look which I imagine was probably hand rubbed but I don't really have the confidence to try that.

Thanks all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJNnAw-rXng

pay close attention to the order the colors are applied, I have only done 3 bursts so far so I am far from experienced but found this most helpful, plus do a search here and you will find a lot of info....best advice is to practice on piece of scrap first , it takes time and patience.

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MK5acoustics.com

After applying the seal coats of shellac you may want to use the dye dissolved in denatured alcohol with just a small amount of shellac as a binder, and mist on semi-dry coats to build your burst without building excessive finish. After you are happy with it, spray a couple more sealer coats to lock it in. Then carefully apply your top coats over that. You don't want to rub through the sealer coats and start moving the dye around.

Have you seen this book? I haven't pulled it out to check just now, but it contains recipes and instructions for just about every popular finish:

http://www.stewmac.com/How-To/Books/Fin ... -Step.html

My very first 'burst was a three color tobacco on a mandolin that I built quite a few years ago. There are two ways to do a 'burst - you can either apply stain directly to the wood or seal the wood and spray color coats that fade to the center or into each other. They give a different final appearance - if you stain the wood you can get a deep wet look to the finish and you can usually highlight the grain of the wood better. You can also do a combination - some stain directly to the wood to pop the grain and a little color in the final coats.

As I understand it, most of the old Gibson bursts were hand wiped into the wood, then followed by the clear coats. Most modern bursts are sprayed as part of the color. In his book on mandolin building Roger Siminoff discusses the old Gibson technique. And Erlewines book mentioned above is the bible on finishing. Here was my first attempt documented in an old forum that no longer exists.

http://www.kitguitarsforum.com/archives ... 65_0_7_0_C

I tried the wipe on method but didn't like the results so I sanded most of it off and then I used an air brush, but now I have a little gravity feed HPLV gun that I use on guitars. One little trick is to start with a dilute mixture of your color and lacquer and add more tint as you move out towards the edge. I have no experience with TruOil - everything I do is either nitro or water born lacquer. Oh, one potential problem with the wipe on method is that you need to seal anything that you don't want colored - wood binding, edges, rosettes, etc. You can scrape plastic binding but wood will soak up the color.

Oh, another trick, I put the instrument on its back or top on a stool in the middle of the shop and walk around it shooting from the center towards the edge. That way I can control the transition from one color to the next and make it uniform. The last thing you want is a big run on an instrument hanging in a spray booth.

Good luck. Save any cutoffs of both types of wood and practice before you shoot the real thing.

Thanks everyone, am I wrong in thinking a tobacco burst can be done with one colour?

Yes.

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Aaron Craig

Traditionally the term is used for amber to red to brown (almost black). That's one of the things that makes it difficult - the transitions between colors. Get the Erlewine book, maybe the Siminoff one too.

fwiw, I've done single color "bursts" - here is an all mahogany guitar with a "shade top" - its very subtle - just darkens slightly as it approaches the edges



and here is a "amber burst" - still two colors but the center amber fades to a brown at the edges. Start on page 11 of this long thread

http://www.harmonycentral.com/forum/for ... 33-/page11

The wood was stained to pop the grain, then the burst applied in the finish coats.

There are all kinds of variations of the somewhat generic term "tobacco 'burst" (...just google it & see). Restricting yourself to just one colour dye does it a disservice IMO. You'd at least want a bit of an amber ground.

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Dave
Milton, ON

That shaded mahogany top looks lovely.aiming for an Amber to Brown sunburst.I've got some Brown and yellow stain that I can apparently mix with the tru oil.anyone tried doing a burst by rubbing dyed tru oil?

Mike I would love to see that done


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It's a good idea to think about recovery if you mess up, especially since it's your first one. If you don't seal the top, as in, you want to do the early Gibson style burst rubbing into the bare wood, you may not be able to sand all the color off if it turns out bad and you want to do it over. Sealing with shellac first will allow for an easier recovery. If you have to sand off the burst be sure to go from the center to the edges with your sandpaper or palm sander. If you go edges to center you will drag the dark color to the center imbedding it into the soft spruce and it may not be possible to get out. I know this from experience! I had to redo my first burst twice before I got it right. Good luck.

I have used Tru Oil with Transtint (but not for a burst). You shouldn't have any problems. Experiment first before you do it for real.

Go about 1/2 way through this set of shots and you will see how I did a sunburst on raw wood, made a mistake, took it off, and re-did it. I would do it again this way.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/ruby1638/ ... 130471994/

Ed

I've got to disagree with this. The only bursts I do are single color, and I feel they are successful. Keep in mind that I'm not necessarily trying to mimic a production burst with this, more of just an "antique" as I call it. But I think it's pretty successful.
Mahogany burst.

Lutz burst

Cedar bust.

I've done a few...
A tobacco burst can be done with one color (besides the base color of antique amber/yellow), and black. You get the basic burst on (I put it on bare wood for the most clarity) and then tint the tobacco with black (small amounts!) to get the edge darker. I use an airbrush on mandolins and a small gun with a very fine tip on guitars.

A great looking sunburst Haans;.....your instruments and posts are some of my favorites on this forum...I look forward to them and value your opinion

Yes Haans I agree with Jack


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If you can get the spray rig from your friend that would give you the best chance of having an even transition from Brown to amber. Hand rubbed burst look great but are not easy. I would try to do a bunch on test pieces of maple. The spruce is the hard part so test on that also. For what you are doing with a tru oil finish not a lacquer topcoat you may want to do just what you are saying in your post. Brown stain like trans tint or something like that and amber/yellow light brown, mixed with shellac. Seal the guitar well with shellac sand it smooth with 320 or 400 then with a very small amount of colored shellac coming out of the spray gun spray your burst. When you like it very light! coats of shellac should be sprayed over the burst "test this first also!" When nice and dry Smooth sand that without hitting your color then try doing your normal Tru oil finish. It could be a great thing! I would test this whole process first before doing it to your guitar. Just my thoughts always many ways to go just enjoy it. Burst are great and fun to do. I'm not on here much but if you ever need any tips along the way feel free to message me.