How to paint your guitar by hand: Staining

Hey guys! I’m Brad, and I make how-to videos. I do custom painting projects, guitar painting, airbrushing, spray can painting, wood working, and a variety of other finishing work and tutorials. Please subscribe and check out my channel for more!

The time has come! The votes are in, and the result is a tutorial on how to paint your guitar without having to spray anything. No paint guns, no compressors, and no spray cans. This paint job will be done entirely by hand.
I realize that this option was popular because it doesn't require any specialized equipment, so in keeping with the theme of using accesible stuff, this paint job will be done entirely using products that can be found at your local home depot or similar hardware stores.

The shopping list for this particular job is pretty small. I used a standard sandpaper to prepare the wood for stain, and an old cut up t-shirt as well as some 0000 steel wool to apply it. You can also use a foam brush or paint brush to apply the stain, but you will want to use a rag to while off the excess.
The stains that I used for the front of the guitar are made by MinWax. They are: 230 Earl American, and 231 Gunstock. I don't use the two in one stains that are intended to provide a final finish. I don't believe that they are as high a quality as the finish you can get by doing these jobs in two steps.
On the back and sides of the guitar I used a black cherry stain made by Varathane. Like the top, this was applied using steel wool, and the excess was removed with a section of t-shirt.
I did something along the lines of a sunburst effect on the top. Since the stains that I used to create this burst effect were only one number apart in tone, the effect is much more subtle than that which you would find on something like a cherry burst gibson, or a tobacco burst fender. You can achieve a more pronounced burst effect simply by using stains that contrast more significantly.
The guitar body that I used for this video is a bare piece of alder cut in the telecaster shape.

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Thanks for watching.

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