finishing with nitrocellulose lacquer

[Bluemando]

I am planning to finish with NC Lacquer and was thinking about getting the Badger 150 air brush from stew-mac to do the spraying for the burst. Will I be able to use the same airbrush for all of the finishing, or the burst only.
What type of spray equipment do you experienced luthiers use?

[bobz]

I`ve used that airbrush to completely spray finish my classical guitar. Do`nt hesitate buying tha tool as it`s excellent. You can use the fine needle for sunbursting and the medium or course for finishing. I use mine with an airbrush compressor with a receiving tank. Here`s a dirty picture, I might be banned from this site.

[Bluemando]

thanx bobz, by the way,
the guitar looks great

[sunburst]

I have a Badger air brush and I've used a Pasche (sp?). Of the two I prefer the Pasche. You might want to go to an art store and check out some air brushes before you buy.

I only use the air brush for touch-ups, small projects, etc. For finishing complete instruments I use a full size spray gun.

My sunbursts are hand rubbed and only touched up as necessary with the air brush. It can be difficult to avoid little "spits" without a lot of practice bursting with an air brush.

[Bluemando]

sunburst,
What do you mean by "hand rubbed"? I am new to building, so any advice is helpful. If you could, would you give a little more detail as to how you make your burst.
Thanx
Terry

[sunburst]

By hand rubbed I mean the stains are rubbed onto the wood by hand with rags. The Loars were done this way and there is a difference in the look of a rubbed sunburst and a sprayed (airbrushed) sunburst. A rubbed stain tends to accentuate the grain or figure in the wood while a sprayed stain tends to cover or obscure the figure.
After the rubbed sunburst is done I usually touch-up the edges with the airbrush.

Here's a link to an earlier thread with more info.