Materials: Finishes

Finishes

The finish of a musical instrument can be critical to its musical success. At Bear Meadow, we use materials that at first glance seem common, but we use them in a not-so-common way.

I use a rare and fairly costly shellac (about three times as much as the best Behlen's shellac) that I get from Kremer Pigments, on Elizabeth St, in New York City. It's called Ruby shellac, and gives a beautiful glow to the wood. (Like a woman's rouge makeup: you're not supposed to know it's there-it's just supposed to make you want to look at her face more.) Shellac is one of the hardest finishes, even harder than the varnish we use. This makes it a very good underlayment for the varnish, as well as a good sealer for the inside of the instrument.

I use a "one-pound cut" mixture: one pound of shellac diluted in a gallon of alcohol. Of course, you don't want to make up that much, as dissolved shellac has a shelf life of a year or less. I make up a cup at a time with this formula: 1 ounce of shellac in a cup of alcohol. Use a specially formulated denatured alcohol, not the kind you get at hardware stores--these alcohols have water in them, which will not help your shellac at all.

We use Target Coating's hybrid alkyd brushing varnings, HybriVar. This is a premier waterborne varnish that avoids all the environmental and use problems of oil varnishes. It is available on-line at targetcoatings.com. We use it as a seven-coat wiping varnish, which yields a tough yet thin coat which is ready to rub out 24 hours after application. Time between wipe coatings is a fantastic 15 minutes! I have found that no brushwork is necessary to achieve a perfect finish.

For full application instructions see Target Coating's web page .

I use some abrasives available from beauty salon suppliers:

In particular, there is are abrasive-loaded foam blocks in 180 and 320 grits that are handy. These are just the thing for quickly working around the curves of a scroll and getting into the corners of a fiddle edge.
I also like the flexible nail files available there in various grits. These are great for getting around curves on the body of the instrument. When the end is dull, just snap off an inch and you have another fresh end.

Other abrasives I use are garnet "open" cut, in 100A, 120A, 180A, 220A and 320A grits. These do not clog so easily with shellac and varnish. For finer work and repairs to the finish, I use wet/dry papers up to 1200 grit.

Final rub out is with #0000 steel wool. All steel wool is not created equal. Some will have strands of other grades mixed in, and will cause tears and screaming. Basically, all brands of steel wool are turned out by two companies (in the United States, at least). Only one company makes the good stuff. Any brand which displays an elephant's head logo is made by the good company.

The final treatment is a very high-carnuba wax. Currently, I prefer a floor wax called TreWax. It is available in a reddish-brown formulation which goes particularly well with the woods used in Bear Meadow dulcimers.

For tack rags, I keep a supply of clean dish towels. One gets stored in a can, and I sprinkle in mineral spirits from time to time, to keep it just a little moist. This makes a great dust grabber.

And finally, keep a supply of small flannel cloths for wax rub out.

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