Stratocaster Re-Rebuild!

Cadorman said:
I've always wondered: is the first h in naphtha silent, so it sounds like nap-tha? Or do you pronounce it like you have a lisp?
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The first “h” is taken with the preceding “p” to form the consonant digraph, “ph”, which is pronounced like an “F”.

So, the correct pronunciation is, “NAF-tha”.
 
Cadorman said:
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90% of the sanding done. I'm going to finish up in the morning. It's certainly a dusty mess with 320 grit. I'm glad it's super nice out for a couple more days.

Now I'm debating. Translucent red, or orange? I have cherry red and lemon yellow so I can mix up most flavors of orange. Remember, white pickguard.
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Hope it's not too late but, how about ... Tangerine Orange!! That deep but bright reddish old-school orange crush colour
 
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I'm putting in all new wiring while I am at it. Since I am blocking the tremolo solid I have removed the claw and springs. You can see where I soldered the string ground wire right into a little hole in the side of the block. My normal 35 watt iron couldn't melt the solder with that block, so I warmed it up for a minute with my heat gun and broke out my bigger iron. Worked great.

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Here you can see the new hole I drilled from the control cavity into the trem block cavity for a more direct approach. Instead of having 2 ground wires soldered to the back of the volume pot I will solder the ground from the trem block to the lug that is screwed into the floor of the control cavity and just have the lug wire go to the back of the pot. I may investigate a couple of quick connects to make the pickguard removable without unsoldering anything.
 
Far Rider said:
The grain will still be visible, right? It reminds me of Redwood.
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Yeah, it shouldn't get any darker now. This is a bright red cherry dye. The problem I've found is that when starting with a piece of wood that isn't really white it ends up much darker red than anticipated. If you try a light mix of dye you get a weird pinkish brown. That's one of the reasons maple makes such a great top wood. It's really light colored, so transparent colors stay true.
 
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And here we are after another 5 light coats of nitro. I've been waiting about 15 minutes between coats. This stuff is dry to the touch in under 10 minutes. I will let it off gas for a couple of hours in the garage and then bring it into the air-conditioned basement, let it hang for a few more hours and then smooth the finish again with steel wool. I don't have any flaws that I know of, so I shouldn't need to go any lower than the 000 steel wool again. I'm going to have to run over to Rockler and get another rattle can of nitro. I've sprayed 10 coats so far which is about half a can and it is now empty. It's going to take 5-10 more coats to get it where I want it.
 
Serious question.

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Should I put my decal on it, or leave the Fender decals I bought online? They are both waterslide decals. It would be easy enough to sand down the gloss nitro on the front of the headstock and redo it. The back side is all satin nitro.
 
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