# Dye black walnut, guitar



## cool09 (Oct 18, 2012)

I want to dye a black walnut guitar body into a tobacco sunburst (like below) but not sure what color dye I should buy to get a medium/dark brown from the black walnut. If I use a medium brown dye on the black walnut I could end up with a color entirely different than what I want, right? A light dye will bring out the natural black walnut color (plus any tint in the dye itself)? (Actual body is bottom photo.)


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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

What is in the picture isn't a dye but a paint that is air brushed around the parameter of the base. If you don't have an air brush you can probably choke your sprayer down to a fine mist to achieve this. If you are using a lacquer finish on the guitar you can just spray a black lacquer around the edges and then topcoat with the gloss lacquer over the entire base. If your finishing with an oil based polyurethane you can use an oil based enamel however you will need to thin it quite a bit to get it to mist better. Then topcoat with the poly. Just get some scrap wood and practice on that before you try anything on the guitar.


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## cool09 (Oct 18, 2012)

I'm talking about changing the color of the middle of the body to something more brownish. I don't entirely like the black walnut color. What color dyes should I look at it?


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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

OK, I believe if you are trying to go for the look of the center of the guitar in the top picture, I would probably start with striping the finish off the guitar base. You should then try to sand as much of the original stain off as you can. Then I would use a wood conditioner to seal off the grain so perhaps it doesn't get the stripe look again. Now when you go stain it again I would look for a dye that has red in it perhaps a colonial maple or light mahogany. You may have to mix something yellow into it like golden oak. I don't have any current literature here to give you specific colors. I have a very old Garret Wade Woodworking catalog (1988) and it list a color "Red Maple" that looks like a good start to me. I wouldn't spray a full wet coat of the dye on but put in on in thin layers, more or less shading it. This will help subdue the stripes. Color matching just takes a lot of tinkering. You just need to get some scrap wood and work out the finish procedure before you put anything on the guitar.


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