Following on from part 11, with the artwork now applied, the piglet was ready to be clear coated. I tried hanging the guitar body up to spray it but I found that the Rustoleum clear spray that I was using didn't want to come out in a mist like the colours I'd used had, and thus it was causing lots of drips. I then lay the body flat on a piece of polysterene to spray the front, but when it had dried I discovered a clear rectangular imprint of where the polystyrene block had been positioned on the back, and so I had to sandpaper away the offending shape before re-spraying once again. I had a problem in that I wanted to spray the guitar body lying flat, but I didn't want to have to rest it on top of anything, so I came up with the idea of cantilevering the body over thin air, which effectively meant very carefully clamping the makeshift handle (screwed to the body in the neck pocket) to my workbench (see photo above).
Here we see the piglet in the sunshine after having had several coats of clear applied and having been left to dry and harden for a couple of days.
I couldn't help attaching the neck and positioning some key components upon the body so as to get a better idea of what the finished guitar is going to look like.
Here we see the piglet out in the sunlight again, but now the body has been wet and dry sanded through the grits and has been buffed up to a nice shiny surface using rubbing compound. Unfortunately in this photo we don't really get an idea of the smoothness of the finish.
However this photo of the back of the guitar gives a much better impression of the smoothness of the finish.
And on this later photo taken inside the conservatory you can clearly see reflections from the windows on the surface of the piggy.
I spent a few days getting the headstock sorted out with a logo and a clearcoat. My first attempt was a failure - probably because I didn't spray an initial clear coat onto the surface before applying the water slide transfer - so I ended up stripping it back again and doing it all over again. Clear coat, then apply the transfer, then three more clear coats and leave a couple of days to harded before sanding and shining up using more of that magic rubbing compound. And, as you'll notice in the photo above, I also mounted the machine heads.
Again, with the neck in place, here's how the piggy is looking.
All that is left to do now is the final assembly. I'm going to wait a few days before doing this as I need a helping hand from my partner in crime on this venture, as we're going to be doing things such as positioning the bridge and lining it up accurately. Two heads are much better than one when doing important fine measurements.
Hopefully this little piggy will be ready for our next batch of gigs.
G L Wilson
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