The Steel Guitar Forum

Tom, I am in the process of building a T8 along the lines of a Fender. I have some real nice curly maple and I am an admirer of the finishes you get with True Oil. I want to use a red leather die and would like to know if you mix this in with the True Oil or do you apply it seperatly?

I saw an earlier post on this but I can't seem to locate it.

Thanks, Henry
PS Others feel free to jump in on this

Hi Henry ... typically you would do any dye or staining separately and before any finish coats. The exception would be that when spraying lacquer and other clear material, you can add a little dye to the clear for tinting and bursts. And as always, its a good idea to do some testing on some scrap / off cut pieces first.

Thanks Tom, I thought I had read somewhere about adding the dye to the True Oil. Henry

In my correspondence with Birchwood Caseys product engineers, they did not recommend adding any colorant / tint / dye to Tru Oil. That said, there are some that have done it, I've just opted to stick with the manufactures recommendations. If you were to add dye to Tru Oil, you would need to make sure that the dye was compatible with an oil base. And again, its always best to try any experiments on scrap first.