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May as well make a thread dedicated to this to eliminate the tons of other random threads i'd start anyway with questions.. Gonna go for a Competition Orange Mustang with a string through Tornado bridge...
Kinda like this, matching head stock and all.

This is the exact color combination i'm going for.



I bought a Contoured Duo-Sonic body from cooterfinger. Amazingly good work. He made me a pearloid pick guard also




After a long debacle and learning experience I have a Squier Jaguar neck on the way, instead of the Jagmaster neck i originally ordered (fucking conversion necks).

Took it over tonight to a buddies house who had a drill press, tons of tools, and a whole lot more wood working skill than I and drilled the body for the string through bridge. It came out really fucking slick.





I ordered a bunch of finishing supplies and Orange Grabber laquer for the base body color...


Now that the holes are drilled i'm pretty much ready to start the finishing process on the body. I've done a lot of reading on it but any advice people on here can give would be much appreciated! Moar pics, updates and questions to come for sure...

Your buddy did a really nice job on the string thru. Looks ace.
I've got to get a bigger drill press so I can do this too.

Mine looks ghetto in comparison. Hand drill + no patience = wonky ferrules.

yeah i was almost going to hand drill then my buddy said he would help. His dad is an old school carpenter type and i explained to him what i wanted to do and he got into it. Started busting out measuring tools and all sorts of weird tools and shit i've never even seen.. i basically drank some beers and watched him do everything. The guy was a certified wood working bad ass.

Spent about 3 hours sanding down the body tonight. I started with a 220. From there I went 320, 400 then finally 600. I noticed most advice says take it to 320 before sealer then prime coats but I figured that the smoother everything is from the start the cleaner the finish will turn out. I figured tomorrow i'd spray 3 or 4 coats of sealer waiting an hour or two between coats. I'm going to let it dry for a couple days just to make sure it's 100% dry (well mostly cuz im a lazy SOB) then sand the sealer lightly before i lay the primer coat down. Does this sound like a legit plan? What grit should i lightly sand the sealer before moving on to painting the primer? Also What is a good solution to wipe the body down with before i spray the sealer? i wiped gently with a paper towel and used compressed air to blow it off already..

Fuck i hate Washington weather... I've been waiting all day to spray the primer on this thing and the weather isn't cooperating. It's not raining, its sprinkling just light enough to where the ground it dry, but i can feel the droplets hitting the side of my face every time i go outside. Oh well.. better luck tomorrow.

Had a break in the weather yesterday and managed to get a primer coat on. For as much whiskey as i had it came out suprisingly well. i had one run in the coat where i sprayed heavy but it seemed to melt and spread itself out because i cant find it now.

Got the first couple coats of color on today. The grain is showing through in a couple of spots so it's not perfect, but it's coming along fairly well nicely. Gonna let this dry for awhile then sand it smooth again and lay a couple more coats down. I need to order a couple more cans of the Orange paint and also find something to do the stripes with. It stays as is until then...

Looking good dude. Can't wait to see more.

So i got a Squier Jaguar neck for my project. It has a glossy finish all around. I want to make a matching head stock with the body. I don't need to refinish the entire neck just the top of the headstock. I was almost thinking of using a sanding block and sanding the top to bare wood, being careful to not hit the edges. Then taping it off around the top leaving maybe a 1/32" gap that was when i spray the nitro clear over it, i can try and blend the edges of the headstock with the original clear coat... does this sound like a good idea? got a better idea? or is this completely a bad idea all together? On a side note, i noticed the Jaguar neck is damn near identical to my PS mustang neck. Even the tuners look exactly the same. It also has a really interesting/unique grain collor on the rosewood. At first i was kinda pissed but now i almost like it's uniqueness. Its way far off from any other one ive seen.

Just make sure to sand all the "orange peel" off the finish. I didn't do such a great job on my Telecaster in several spots.

The pics of are from right after i sprayed. I'm actually pretty stoked because it seemed to smooth out more and id say its about 90% perfectly smooth now to the touch. I want to build up another couple coats and hopefully fill in the spots where the grain shows a little, then sand lightly to even out and remove any fucke dup parts. then spray one final coat over it to kinda smooth things out then LIGHTLY sand it smooth before i start the clear. I had poor planning and didnt order enough paint so i ran out... gotta wait to order some more.

The best result I ever got when painting a matching headstock was by spraying straight onto the face of the headstock without sanding. I just made sure it was 100% clean. I then blended the clear coat in the way you described. My mate has had the guitar for about 7 years now and it still looks great.

The neck wasn't too glossy tho so it might be an idea for you to key the surface of yours very slightly...

Got the matching head going... i ran out of paint on the first pass though, waiting for more to arrive to finish it. I'm really liking it so far though.

Lovely colour. Have you figured out what to use for the comp stripes yet?

Dodge Hemi Orange for stripes, Grabber Orange for body. Cooterfinger told me about the color combo and i think its going to work well.

Matching headstock... do i do an decal or just leave it blank? I kinda wanted to get a white decal that just said "FENDER" cuz i like the look, but the more i think about it the more i just feel like a prick doing it... I wouldnt mind having a custom one made, but i dont want to spend a ton of cash on one.

who cares, as long as you're upfront about it should you decide to sell (although anyone should be able to realize an actual comp duo didn't exist). looks great so far.

I did a mismatch black headstock on my comp(ish) orange fender bullet. I left in blank on the grounds that it plays up the DIY.


I love fender guitars, but at the same time they can fuck right off

I decided to leave it blank. the head stock came out pretty well. not perfect but i'm def happy with it. started spraying it with clear coat. I've sprayed about 3 coats so far. Im thinking i'll do maybe three more and see how it goes. so far, so good though... The body is all painted, gonna let it set for a couple more days and get to work masking for the comp stripe.