I started the staining by sanding the wood down to 360 grit. I'm not sure if that is too much or too little. I also had an idea to leave the bare wood in sight as a decal on the headstock by using a sticker as a masking tape. That did not work out as the stain immediately diluted the glue from the sticker and it fell off.
I applied the first coat with a rag. The result was not very good looking, as expected.
After a few hours of waiting I applied the second coat. At that time it was clear that there were some spots around the neck joint where the stain wouldn't stick. There are invisble traces of glue there that I did not manage to sand off. In that sense it might have been wiser to apply the finish before glueing the neck on. After the second round, I sanded some of the stain off to generate a burst effect. It is difficult to capture the color to a photograph. In reality it is somewhere between the two following figures. Not as red and light, but not as dark either as in the pictures.
After that, I applied the 3rd coat, and did the sanding to that, too. Tried to fit some HW to place just for the looks. The color is about right.
The next step will be the application of the Danish oil.
Some notes:
- I did not manage to get an even coat. There are places where there is too much stain and there are some parts where there is too little.
- The glue will mess up the stain, so more care should be applied.
- Making the burst by sanding is not easy and the result is semi-random. With one piece body that might be an easier task. Now the underlying woods are of slightly differet tone. Also, it is very easy to sand too much as it goes pretty much so that at first nothing happens and then suddenly one swipe is enough to sweep away majority of the stain.
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