Gluing Tolex

[jhale667]

No, you were being a vandal and a criminal, shocker.
I do live here; and have never done anything so stupid...


But back on topic, as cab restoration is actually interesting...

[rustoffa]

I wish I had bought a Silvertone cab I found @ Galaxy that was covered in truck bed liner. You could always bust out the fine sandpaper & minwax.

who finished a cabinet with paint instead of tolex/tweed/leather? - Telecaster Guitar Forum

[Diamondjimi]

That's some cool shit,right there!

[GAR]

Remember a local band "slumlord" their ads logo was a cockroach smokin a joint?

One of these cabs had metamorphosated thru a number of spray-painted color changes. It had been white, then red, dark blue, and back to black again.

The grille was fine.

I took that grille, bought a used JCM900 with perfect tolex, stuck that good grille from the Slumlord cab and flipped it with a mixed pair of repaired Celestion 75's, and a pair of Carvin British 12's.

It sounded okay, I didn't like it.. flipped it got my money out of it plus the better sounding 75's and I robbed the JCM tag, the better-conditioned backboard and the dual-input jackplate by substituting an aluminum square scrap painted black. Buyer didn't even notice the single jackplate.

(btw I noticed there are 4 series of 75's made over the years and IMO the first series with the halfblack labels, and the dash-4 or series 4 sound really really good but we'll get to the corksniffing bullshit on that later)

Okay, so I am still down to the ugly painted backboard and shell of the Slumlord cab.. came with G12-65's which are not my favorite but a great deal at $200.

I figured out sitting with this thing on the porch, that the paint had to come off while leaving the tolex intact, which wasn't going to be easy.

So there we sat, me and it, I and the ugly shitblock having coffee while trying to meditate on the back porch listening to Mel Gibson screaming again at his new fiancee. At this point, I do not know what I am doing, but Mama has been saying this for years. Now I know what she means.

I have become: transformed, enlightened, inquisitive.. oh and i have to take a shit because it's 11am and the cool ocean breeze is chilling my grossly enlarged coffee soaked gullet so I'm farting at the same time and there it dawned on me I am now the Tolex Whisperer.

"Speak to me ::pfffft:: tell me how to clean you ::bfffft-brrrpppt:: what must I ::fffuddffftt:: do to heal your graffittoeied state?"

And I swear it talked to me, not in word but in images.

I saw: acetone, lacquer thinner, yellow wood glue, and masking tape. I saw: honing and drawing its hide, me, there, standing with putty knives dripping solvents and getting superhigh while some fucker who thinks he can surf mouths incomprehensible questions on the project. He receives the you-go-fuckoffnow-smile. I keep scraping.

All these chemicals are sitting in the sunlight, and in my bloodstream and on my brain but I keep scraping - first the cab shell, then the backboard.

It comes off first like layers of cake frosting with the acetone. What that does is melt the paint layers really quick and then flashes off really quick, without damaging the tolex.

I got a pretty fair technique down after a while, a rhythm you might say of it: first, pouring a 16" drip line straight off the quart on to the back board, second a smearing of it while the paint softens up and wrinkles in ribbons like the melted 1" recording tape from the last bonfire.. third, before it dries and is still soft, I pull the 4" wide angled putty knife I've bent into a slight "c" shape using the curved edge and grabbing it by the tip and the handle pull straight literally carving the paint right off it. Then repeating the process dozens of times.

It was interesting. Different band names started coming up from under the paint layers.. "speak to me" I begged of it ".. where have you been? What musics have you annoyed others with? Who had used and abused you?"

I felt like a Guitarcheologist even though I am now but a Tolex Whisperer.

[GAR]

Once the scraping was finished in acetone, I used the lacquer thinner to wipe it all down trying to detail-out the hidelike grain, but not all the paint comes out.

It holds some pigments like a stain. It looks dark greyish in some places and in others it looks perfect. "Look" I show my chick, Lefty "this whole fucking bag of paint came off that last cabinet." In weight, it was probably a half-pound but that's wet weight from the added thinners. In size, envision about one and a quarter gallon of scrapings - that's alot of paint.

I guess Slumlord were the first to own it, that was the oldest logo painted on so it took a bit of detailing to get the last of the white out of the elephant-grain.

After gluing down the little dogears and tear flaps with the yellow glue and masking tape to hold it, I came back a day later removing the tape pieces and sanded it down by hand with a little dull 100 grit sandpaper.

Then, the plastic corners get taped off, the white piping too, and it gets sprayed back to black: first with the cheap 99 cent Home Depot flat black just for color.

That dries for 3hours, I've found that solvent isn't compatible with good paint over it so it needs to dry well before the final coat is complete..

The cheap flat just gets "dusted" on, very lightly to prepare for the Krylon semigloss black.

This stuff is over 4 bucks a can, and with the wind going it'll eat two cans so I save the best for last. I lay it out on the neighbors' patio driveway (because why mark up mine with the overspray) and move in crisscross fashion: first, side-to-side motions, then slowly straight up and down.

The side-side motion pretty much fills in the semigloss, but you get shadows from the spray width. So instead of going again in that direction and getting heavy (and filling in the elephant grain now exposed) its best to just go lite to make the sheen even, like the original tolex used to be.

I cram that JCM900 grill in it with some other mismatched Celestions and the new owner is a happy camper!

So the moral of the story is: Can you paint your cabinets, yes, but it takes work and the results looks like shit. Can you remove paint off painted cabinets and restore it, yes but you have a big mess on your hands and the for the effort you may as well retolex it.

But if you don't mind the mess, here's the breakdown:

Time - breakdown/reassembly, 6 hours
- scraping with solvents, 3 hours
- recoloring over thinner stains, 2 hours

Cost - glue, tape, thinners: 19.00

Result - 1to5 scale, 1 being the shit before condition 5 being brand-new, probably a 3

[GAR]

oh add the paint duhh.. 6, total 25 bucks

[Igosplut]

More feats of memory that are impossible GARgle.

How very convenient it is for you to knock other peoples gear and one-up everybody with your vast knowledge when you "CAN'T" post ANYTHING that you own or do....

The funny thing is, is that the things that you have positively proven (about yourself, harassing a soldiers mother,egging on suicide, Advocating child abuse, being called out for wrong/copied info, ect) over the years, is what we DO positively know about you. We,ve all seen it...

So no Gar, you don't have to post anything. You've already proved who you are.....And it isn't good at all....

[kwame k]

Oh, but he has you on ignore

[GAR]

I think the reason guys get into doing clear and stained finishes, is they just don't understand how to get good results when tolexing.

Cabs look nice finished, but that first ding hits or scrapes it and you get pissed.

Tolexing comes from the luggage days, it keeps moisture off the wood. It is easily repaired by gluing down the flaps, you can reglue patches cut from excess inside the cab and then it looks fine.

But the modern Marshall glue used today is far inferior to what they used in the past, it is stickey, never dries, and in fact releases the vinyl covering easily.

You can almost pick it off with your fingernail, and in a hot van it moves as if it's just tacked on at the edges.

[Diamondjimi]

Uh,Gar....

[indeedido]

You can almost pick it off with your fingernail, and in a hot van it moves as if it's just tacked on at the edges.

Is that in your van down by the river?

[GAR]

adding you to ignore list, dickhead

[LoungeMachine]

adding you to ignore list, dickhead

Easier than having to deal with the truth, huh?

[jhale667]

[Nitro Express]

More feats of memory that are impossible GARgle.

How very convenient it is for you to knock other peoples gear and one-up everybody with your vast knowledge when you "CAN'T" post ANYTHING that you own or do....

The funny thing is, is that the things that you have positively proven (about yourself, harassing a soldiers mother,egging on suicide, Advocating child abuse, being called out for wrong/copied info, ect) over the years, is what we DO positively know about you. We,ve all seen it...

So no Gar, you don't have to post anything. You've already proved who you are.....And it isn't good at all....

You forgot to add stealing parking meters and spending the stolen loot at the Rainbow Bar and Grill. At least Robin Hood would have given the money to the hungry and poor. Gar got drunk on it.