Disappointed

A couple of weeks ago, I took the fingerboard and all the extra bits off of my violin so I could varnish it. I was really anxious about it, since this is what the world sees, any mistakes at this point will show.

I steeped a really strong pot of tea, (five bags in a cup of water), then used that to put a base of colour on the wood. It was paler than I expected, but that's okay. Then I put on two coats of clear varnish. So far, so good.

Next step is the red-brown varnish. I put it on and it seemed a bit streaky on the neck and sides, but, I thought that after a few coats, it wouldn't show. Then I did the back, streaky with a few small lumps of red, I thought it was a bit weird, but I can sand the surface with fine paper. I thinned it down with some turpentine, calmed myself and started on the front. To my horror, the varnish was very streaky, lots of bits of colour on the surface and other areas, no colour at all. I frantically tried to wipe it off with turpentine and a rag. It came off in blotches.

My next step was to calm myself and think about it. Unfortunately, we were going to be with friends for supper and I had to work at being any fun at all.

The next day, I got out my sand paper, sanded the surfaces of the front and back, and lightly sanded the sides, then used the 2400 grit to smooth it so I could give it another try. I added more turpentine and tried it on a some maple, looked okay, then on a piece of white paper. It had the little streaky blobs in it, as if the varnish was coloured with pigments and they needed to settle.

I let it settle for a day. There was a lot of sediment on the bottom the next day, so I thought, okay, here we go again. Not bad on the neck and scroll, okay on the back, on the front, same nasty mess. Again with turpentine, I tried to take it off and it was a streaky mess.

I got off as much as I could, let it dry, then took a scraper to it and started scraping it down to the bare wood. At that point I decided to call the company (International Violin Supply) that the varnish came from. (This varnish applies very well and virtually anyone can do a good job when using it, blah, blah, blah.)

I explain the problem I've been having and Dude says, "Yeah, that happens once in a while. We don't know why, I'll send you a fresh bottle and hopefully it won't happen again."

That is so unsatisfying. An apology would have been nice, his acting surprised would have even been a bit of comfort.

So, I'm scraping all the varnish off, back to the wood. Roll 'em, take two. I haven't decided if I'll take it off completely, or just the bad parts and use their "fresh bottle" or just the worst parts. I am concerned that if I don't take it all off and start fresh, that I won't be happy with the end result. Maybe I'll look at some other options for varnish.

Thanks for listening.

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