From Lacquer To French Polish

[Yonkle]

I have a nice Lacquer finish on my mandolin 3#. I got to where I did'nt like the neck (hand sticking) so I took it down to bare wood and restained it. Now it looks a bit odd where the lacquer ends and the bare wood begins. Is there a way to blend this? I blended the stain in fine, it's just the line between the lacquer and the bare wood.
My second thought is to take all the lacquer off and do a "French Polish" If I do this is there a way to get the lqcquer off with out changing the tone of the stain?
I took the lacquer off the back of mando #2 and re lacquered it, I used lacquer thinner to remove the lacquer, but it made the back a little lighter than the rest.
I love the color on mandolin#3 so I am worried if I take the lacquer off with thinner I will remove some of the stain too. Is there a way to remove it without harming the stain? Or should I just restain it after getting the lacquer off, then do the polish. Is using lacquer thinner the way to get lacquer off a mandolin or is there another way?
If I do a French polish what do you use to clean or shine it up when it gets fingerprints on it ect. Thanks for any thoughts or suggestions. JD

[Luthier Vandross]

I use chemical strippers, and steelwool to remove lacquer finish on sunbust instruments, the hard part is cleaning the wood nearly back to natural, then reapplying color.

In your shoes, I'd just polish the neck, lacquer... (flame away) doesn't sound very different from shellac, or varnish. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif


M

[crawdad]

If you are VERY careful, you might try to sand and steel wool ALMOST all the lacquer off the neck, stopping before you get into the stain. In other words, patiently leave a thin coat of the lacquer covering the stain on the neck. Let it sit for a bit to dry out even more, then do the french polish over the lacquer. Its worth trying. If that doesn't work to your satisfaction, you'll have to sand it down and restain before doing the FP. One thing I love about FP on necks is that it dries hard and fast--never ever sticky. It feels fantastic, and its so easy to do, especially on a rounded surface like a neck, that you'll soon be addicted. If theres one thing I can't stand, its a lacquered neck that never set up right. That sticky stuff is a drag!

[Yonkle]

thanks guys: I think I will just get all the lacquer off the neck and then re stain the neck and do a french polish on the neck, leave the body lacquer. I've been playing it with the lacquer off the neck and I did remove a lot of the chunky-ness off the back of the neck, it plays much better now, I can hit notes with my pinky now that I used to miss. It' just the lacquer line that bugs me to look at, so I will get rid of that today and start a FP on the neck. JD

[Yonkle]

I got her done. I ended up taking all the lacquer from the "V" in the headstock all the way to the body. You can see in photo 2 had a lot of lacquer there. I also took almost 1/8 of a inch of wood off the back of the neck to slim it up, I had it way to chunky. Then I sanded it back down all the way to 1500 grit, then restained, and then got some "blond" shellac flakes and mixed with alcohol (2-lb. cut) and rubbed it in, just enough coats to flat sand it out and wet sand to a shine. I can see now why lacquer is used more than French Polish, there is a knak to getting it to go on smooth. After finishing I rubbed it lightly with 0000 steel wool and it is very smooth and fast, feels much better not only from the FP but form sliming down the neck too. Thanks for the help...JD

[Luthier Vandross]

Sweet! Looks great!


M