How do you stop dust/Lint/specs from showing up in light colors?
 

I've been painting guitars for around 7 years now and I have noticed that whenever I have a white or light colored guitar body, there is ALWAYS minor dust, tiny lint hairs, or even an unknown black spec or two. I have been working hard to prevent this but haven't been successful. The contaminants are not likely from my clothing or hands because I wear a white suit and gloves. I suppose the lint could have settled on the white suit in storage but that's almost impossible to stop this.

But I'm at my witts end in getting the perfection I'm after. Any tips?

Here's a picture of my work in progress (drying). From afar it looks great. Really it looks ok even from a few feet away. But it's my staring hard up close that drives me nuts. The other thing is that it's a building problem with successive coats of clear. I use lacquer and it takes 9 or so thin coats to build enough to level sand. With this many coats there are LOTS of chances for dust to get in. I'm very much frustrated with not having a solution. Anyways, any tips are greatly appreciated!

http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/328/dsc0004vdp.jpg

Do you use tack cloth right before you shoot it?

I do the following as precautions:
-Blow off the surface
-Tack it if I see any specks or lint
-Have the spray fan running (not a down draft but a plenum pulling air past the piece and out of the building)
-Wear a Kimberly Clark suit
-Sweep out the old overspray before shooting


What I don't do (maybe my problems):
-I don't remove every last speck of the previous overspray in my booth
-I don't filter the air coming into the booth
-I don't spray the place down with water before spraying
-I don't ground the workpiece or spray gun
-I don't use any anti-static preventative measures

Those are some extra measures I found when searching. Not sure how important those would be.

Having filtered air will help a lot and tacking whole piece before painting is a must. I also usually blow air with spray gun just right before I begin to paint. That's last counter-dust measure I use.

Switch to SPI Universal Clear and get your film buildup in 3 coats. you will eliminate many of the multi coat contaminations and also end up with a more durable finish.
On the SPI forum there are a couple of guys that use SPI clear on musical instruments.

http://www.spiuserforum.com/showthre...ghlight=guitar

My mistake on the typing there, the gun's Air is filtered. The booths fresh air supply is not filtered (the door is usually open).

Switch to Envirobase One Visit Clear and put down all the clear in on session eliminating time between coats for dust and debris to get caught in between coats,,,

Mutible coats is old technology

Filtered intake air is a must and most of your trouble....also a turbo clear that dries in minutes will help a lot.it'll dry before any dust settles on the work.lightly sand out trash between coats of clear...

All great tips..but about changing up his paint,the old guitars used to be Nitrocellulose laquer,this gave gave the guitars that disinct warm classic sound that everyone is trying to reproduce..and the older the and more worn the that paint got,the better the guitar resonated and sounded beautiful..

Nitrocellulose is hard to find..you can find it but strict EPA laws on it,thats why they stopped using it on guitars and went to other more modern paints.

I have a '59 cream white all original rosewood neck Strat my father bought brand new :D ,,still has the original tweed case too..among 3 other strats.

I been thinking about building another strat,i have a 2 peice swamp ash body,and been researchin a lil where to get the nitro paint,that stuff is crazily dangerous to your health..hope your using a good fresh air respirator system...

i'm thinkin some of that dust is from some leftover overspray in that lil booth over time..maybe take the time to do s thorough cleaning and maybe paint the walls and floor again to make it all freshly clean again...

You just have to stop by any wood finishing supplier (Sherwin Williams Sherwood is one example). Any good woodworking finish supply should have lots of Nitro. It's just not common on cars anymore. Cabinet makers still use it quite a bit. Even with them Pre-Cat is more common. Conventional lacquer just isn't durable enough. Even for building guitars, it's hard to keep it fresh even to make it out the door. The stuff isn't durable at all. But it's a great finish for instruments or no one would use it. It looks great as it wears too.

your on the right track , I just like to offer an alternative when that ****ing SPI band wagon starts rolling again

Not a fan I suppose?

anyway, Idealy for guitar bodies like your doing especialy if your going to be doing a lot of them is to make a paint room that you don't go in and out of yet still be in control. That is mount the part inside the booth and spray will looking through a window so no air carries dirt in etc... check this link for a small booth project that was fun..

less room
less air to control
heat,exchaust
http://www.a2zautoforums.com/showthr...6598#post36598

That's a great idea. Is it a little difficult to spray the workpiece or about the same as being right there with it?

I wonder how hard it would be to automate the gun? It's basically the same pattern over and over again for what I'm doing.

Hope to have planted a helpful seed... There are times you can get in there with it but have another switch inside so you can turn on and off the airflow of the booth fan before opening the door..


http://www.a2zautoforums.com/attachm...chmentid=12967

http://www.youtube.com/user/Milogara...18/IYhxsPih7JE

The exhaust fan doesn't have to be on all the time. But you do need filtered air going in while the bad air is going out. Once the fog is gone turn it off. It is even off during clearing and then turned on after the last of the clear is sprayed to prevent that cloud of over spray from landing on the part(s)