I've been going through the picture gallery and I love how some people put a sunburst look on their boxes. How do you do this, is it possible to do this with wood stain?
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I've seen online a lot of people are using water based dye then doing tons of layers (4-8) of sealer/other stuff, which takes a long time. One guy on a video said doing the dye takes about 15-20 mintues, then doing the sealer/other stuff takes roughly 2 days (applying once every 2-3 hrs). Very time consuming, just trying to find a faster more efficient way.
I didn't know if anyone has used stain instead of dye, stain drys faster and you don't have to do all the sealer/etc or layers on it if you don't want. I did a test last night on a piece of wood with stain and it is very hard to get a nice smooth gradient between two colors with stain. I'm going to visit my local carpenter store and see what they tell me, they sell both stain and dye.
Dye is a lot more flexible and it doesn't obscure the grain, it is also easier to apply than stain. You can mix the dyes with alcohol which doesn't raise the grain or with water which raises the grain but reportedly is more colorfast. I've only used alcohol. It's common for professionals to use up to 30 coats of lacquer. The nice thing is that lacquer dries very fast but 30 coats takes a long time.
Yeah,
It's my understanding that most lacquer that you buy at hardware stores contain mostly reducers and evaporate once dry - meaning very little lacquer ends up on your build.
That may be true, for sure lacquer goes down in thinner coats. According to what I've read, lacquer is much more acoustically transparent than varnish/poly but that may be folklore. I do know that lacquer is much easier to apply as each successive coat melts into the previous coat and no sanding between coats is needed so a smooth finish is much easier. I usually sand the first and last coats; 600 grit gives a nice satin finish. Lacquer is clear whereas varnish is yellowish and poly is bluish, and lacquer just has a nicer appearance. Obviously I'm a lacquer fan.
I did a flamed top by flaming the wood, with a torch. It came out good I think. Stain may be a better way if you don't want to burn up you instrument.
Aniline dye. There are tons of tutorials online on how to do a sunburst with either spray equipment or by hand.