Wood finishing question

[xavier]

Hello all,

I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel! Cabinets are almost ready for veneering (all sides except the front baffle.) I'm planning on painting the front baffles to match the black frames on the accuton drivers that I'm using. (I'm guessing the closest finish would be an eggshell finish.) The front baffle is very complex. (see picture) I'm filling cracks/ breaks between pieces, but since it's plywood (and mare than a little complex) it's never going to be perfectly smooth. It's my understanding that you're not supposed to sand primer. I was wondering if there was some kind of hard core (thick) primer that I [I]could[I] apply and then sand until smooth. I was just planning on using black from a spray can for application. (shrug)

Any comments or suggestions greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[tomzarbo]

A good option for you may be Bondo or a similar type of body filler found in auto parts stores.

http://www.fdsons.com/images/auto/6474910.JPG

If you've never used it, you just scoop some out on a piece of sturdy cardboard and add the required amount of included hardner. It has the consistency of oatmeal without the lumps.
You use a hard plastic squegee to apply it to your baffle. It is good for filling cracks and holes, but will also work well for applying to an entire surface for overall "smoothing" of a piece. I've used it this way, and it works good.
You can go from mixing to applying to sanding within 1/2 hour.

Another thing I use is called "Glazing and Spot Putty" or something like that. See link below:

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgu...B_enUS233US234

It is red, and applied from a tube after priming to fill in all the little holes and scratches, it's not meant to be used on really thick or big holes, just the small stuff you missed with the bondo.

There are other ways to do what you're doing, but this is my suggestion. If you go this route, be careful to not put too much bondo on, or you will be doing a lot of sanding!

Best of luck and please keep us updated on your progress. Those baffles look interesting!
TomZ

[mgrabow]

Bondo for sure...prime it after to see how good you did and do more bondo if needed... keep goping until its perfect...

[xavier]

Well.......the painting process turned into a bit of a nightmare. Hired a car painter to do the work for me. Big mistake. Took me FOREVER to get the cabinets back from the guy. And when I finally got them back......not pretty. Anyway, I'm beyond getting too worked up about it now. As it turns out the veneer is cracking underneath the finish. I don't know what THAT's about. It's not showing the wood underneath, but there's obvious cracking along the grain. Oh well. I'm just glad to have the speakers finally up and running. Here are some more pics

[xavier]

some more photos (only one per message?)

[xavier]

Ahhh.....the files I tried to attach were too big.

Here they are before the (BAD) paint job.

[Sooper]

Lesson learned (the hard way as usual) here:

Primer 1st, then use bondo... The bondo needs something to attach to.

sand / wetsand / reapply bondo as needed (finishing process)

Then paint!!

Bondo tends to release / flake out of un-primered areas as it gets thin and can cause many random curse words.

[mgrabow]

I can not see much in the smaller photos. What kind of veneer it that (the gray parts) Is the cracking on the sides?


Cracking of the veneer on any hand made speaker is ALMOST inevitable... The high end commercial manufacturers that use real veneer use ultra high pressure microwave curing presses along with very stable environment and wood stock dried to exactly the right point before they veneer. That cracking happens to the best of is. Some speaker builders use several coats of hand rubbed wax as a finish and when it cracks they just add more...


I have a set of demo models I am about to put up for auction that have the same thing. I use a high end finish that is pretty good at keeping that from happening and apply hand rubbed wax over it every couple of months or so. They look like new after that...

[xavier]

It's paper backed Braewood. Here's a link:

http://www.worldpanel.com/braewood.htm

Thanks for your words of encouragement. I didn't actually do the veneering and finishing. A brother of a friend did it. He's a local cabinet maker.