bare necked ladies

[J.A.P.]

I need your help! I have two customers that would like the necks of their F5's to be very smooth and slick. I'm considering masking of the better part of the neck before staining and finishing the mandos. I plan to follow up the lacquering by removing the masking and appling a few coats of tru-oil or tung oil to the bare neck. I haven't done this before so I'm not sure if I'll create a royal mess. Can any of you offer some suggestions or alternate methods for bare necks? What are the pitfalls that I should watch out for?

Many many Thanks-----------jap

[Km1000seth]

DO NOT USE ANY OIL ON MAPLE,
maple is an oily wood already, obviously, they get syrup from maple trees. My dad and I were working with maple in the shop, he had just turned down a beautiful bowl on the lathe. When he rubbed tung oil across it, it turned a nasty brown

[sunburst]

There was a thread about this a while back, you still might be able to search it.
Maple, by the way is not an oily wood. Maple syrup is boiled down maple tree sap, but only that produced in the early spring before the buds break. It consists of sugar, water, and traces of other compounds from the tree.

[Km1000seth]

Thanx For Correcting Me Sunburst,
I dont have much expirence with it, but I do know that as soon as you wipe any oil on maple,
it turns the nastiest looking brown color. Id hate to see that happen to two f5s, now if they were A's an the other hand...
anyway. Dont Do It, no matter what the reason. Once it turns That brown color you CANT get it off.

Seth

[Km1000seth]

BTW, the best way that ive found for a smooth neck, Some people might criticize me,but,
I use 0000 steel wool. rub the neck down till the finish turns to a haze, then wipe it down with a clean cloth.

[Chris Baird]

I've used oil on maple necks a number of times and have never experienced any "nastyness". I've tried a number of finishes on the neck and usually prefer either a light oil varnish or a 1/2# cut of shellac then polished lightly with 1500 sandpaper.

[Dave Cohen]

I don't know where the "nasty brown" came from. I have never seen anything like that happen in maple. Violin makers have been finishing violin necks with various oils for literally centuries. That's the traditional way in which it is done. Btw, no finish is impossible to get off. Even "penetrating" finishes don't penetrate more than a few cellular layers - maybe a couple thousandths of an inch.

[Km1000seth]

Ok,
I dont want to get into an arguement with anybody. All I know is that
we bought a lathe and started turning various bowls and such. We used Tung Oil on everything we made. Then We decided to make a bowl which was partly maple, And as soon as the oil would touch the wood it literaly turned brown, like someone left it in a puddle of mug for a few hours. We tried to get it off by putting it back on the lathe and sanding it down, but couldnt. Also my uncle whos the bass player for our band had the same identicle probelem with the neck on his bass. Now, we went back to the hardwood supplier that we use, and talked to a few wood turners. They all said that they never could use an oil on maple because of the same thing. Now I could still be wrong, but I would hate to see two F mandolins came out like our stuff did.

[J.A.P.]

Thanks for the comments. I have had a few posts that get very little action, so I'm encouraged that folks are reading this stuff. Last night I tried some tung oil on a scrap of the neck wood I'm using. It didn't turn brown. In fact it looks pretty nice. However I'm not sure how this neck treatment will look with the dark sunburst on the rest of the instruments. Does anybody have any pictures of bare necks that they can share with me? I'm having trouble visualizing how all this will look. Also could anyone share how they go about finishing an instrument with the naked or semi-naked neck?

Thanks------------jap

[Km1000seth]

Well, Im Glad It Looks Good. Maybe We Just Had Some Real Low Grade Maple.

GOOD LUCK
Seth

[Dave Cohen]

What's more likely, KM1000Seth, is that you had some compromised or contaminated tung oil. There is lots of variation between individual trees of a given species. There is even variation between two pieces of wood from a given log. But I have never seen maple turn brown under the application of any oil finish. A little darkening and a "wet" look, maybe, but never brown. Now, if you apply an oxidizing agent, like potassium permanganate, or etc., you will definitely get a brown color. Oxidizing agents are what traditional finishers call "mordants'. Another possibility is iron contamination. Excess steel wool in a limited amount of oxidizer will produce some soluble iron(II) salt, which in turn will oxidize in the presences of some of the extractives in the wood to iron(III) salts, possibly giving a brown color, or maybe even a dark gray??

[pathazzard]

He mentioned turning on a lathe. I imagine that what he was seeing was the endgrain. Any wood takes a stain darker in the endgrain because it soaks in deeper. Sound reasonable?
Pat Harrell

[mandroid]

with softer mahogany,(younger guitar,younger boy), I used a boning technique, rubbing with a smooth bone piece to close-up the grain and body oil did the rest, #FWIW http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Mastersound]

My 2c worth is with Seth. A light rub along the grain with 0000 steel wool after two light coats of whatever. Makes for a nice silky smooth finish but still protects the wood from sweat and skin oils.