Wood quality Squire VM Jaguar

[Lotek]

Has anyone stripped the paint from a Squire Jaguar CV? I'm curious if the wood is good enough to go with a natural finish. I have one with a burst finish and the wood is quite attractive. I'm looking at purchasing a painted body to refinish, and wondering if I should expect a different quality.
Thanks!

[ryland]

There were a few threads about people stripping them when they were released. It seemed to be really tough to get through all the paint and the bodies seemed to be made of many pieces that may not match.

A quick google search found one of these threads:

viewtopic.php?t=72149

[Lotek]

Thank you ryland, pretty much what I expected. Guess I was just hoping out loud.

[Embenny]

Opaque VM Squiers have always had multi-piece bodies with no consideration given to matching seams.

For the amount of effort it takes to strip that poly, most people would find it far cheaper, easier and more attractive to buy a new unfinished body and sell the old finished one.

[Lotek]

mbene085 I'm also thinking of going that direction. I'm looking at a complete though rough guitar locally to serve as a donor, so using the existing body is my first choice. Natural would be my first choice, but luckily I have a list of colors that i think Jaguars are beautiful in. I've allready decided to go down this rabbit hole so I will probably pick it up and strip it and make a call from there. Thank you for the help!

[Embenny]

Oh, if your heart isn't set on a natural finish, thats a great way to go. If you find the stripping too arduous or the wood underneath too unattractive, you can just sand it down to level the finish and spray a new colour over top. That's the nice thing about thick poly finishes - they can serve as good undercoats for a range of compatible finishes, so you don't have to perfectly strip them as long as they've been sanded flat.

[Lotek]

mbene085 It's really cool your here answering questions for me because you are partially responsible for me taking this project on. Do you remember this thread viewtopic.php?t=108204. from 2018? Jazzmaster pickups in a Jaguar is the ultimate goal. Not that the color is unimportant, it's just another fun part of this project. I'm a retired carpenter, so I'm competent with woodworking tools. I have a number of sanders that will keep the stripping job reasonable time frame if I go that way. But you have a very good point about using the bodies color as a base coat. My inspiration picture is a dark natural with re tort, but I did see a couple dark blues in another thread here today that would do just fine. So Hay Thanks!

[HNB]

Mike is a cool guy.

[CROSS_guitars]

Don't strip!
Just don't do it!

[Lotek]

CROSS_guitars do you mean me? Yeah no one should have to suffer through that. If you mean the body, give me your thoughts.

[Embenny]

mbene085 It's really cool your here answering questions for me because you are partially responsible for me taking this project on. Do you remember this thread viewtopic.php?t=108204. from 2018? Jazzmaster pickups in a Jaguar is the ultimate goal. Not that the color is unimportant, it's just another fun part of this project. I'm a retired carpenter, so I'm competent with woodworking tools. I have a number of sanders that will keep the stripping job reasonable time frame if I go that way. But you have a very good point about using the bodies color as a base coat. My inspiration picture is a dark natural with re tort, but I did see a couple dark blues in another thread here today that would do just fine. So Hay Thanks!

Cool! Glad my OSG ramblings occasionally help someone out

If you're considering dark blue I'll just leave these here. My gunmetal blue HH Jag with its black pickguard and an aged mint for comparison's sake. If I ever change things up on that guitar, it'd be to go with mint or parchment. Very sharp against the dark blue. The solid black can be a little low contrast for my taste, depending on the lighting. B/W/B might suit it better, I find the pinstripe effect of the white layer adds a lot of definition on dark colours.





I think that dark/navy blue is one of the most underutilized colours on offsets. It wasn't part of the 60's CCs so it gets ignored, but it looks so good.

[CROSS_guitars]

CROSS_guitars do you mean me? Yeah no one should have to suffer through that. If you mean the body, give me your thoughts.

Yeah, sorry. I was being slightly facetious.
I believe the wood they use for these is Paulownia/empress. It varies in density and colour.
It can be a very soft timber. If you strip the poly finish off it, you run the risk of the timber being really soft and it will need to be grain filled.
You end up taking 1mm or even thicker of paint off which can modify the shape of the body making it look shoddy.
These are just my thoughts. I'm sure you would do a fine job.

[soul1]

mbene085 It's really cool your here answering questions for me because you are partially responsible for me taking this project on. Do you remember this thread viewtopic.php?t=108204. from 2018? Jazzmaster pickups in a Jaguar is the ultimate goal. Not that the color is unimportant, it's just another fun part of this project. I'm a retired carpenter, so I'm competent with woodworking tools. I have a number of sanders that will keep the stripping job reasonable time frame if I go that way. But you have a very good point about using the bodies color as a base coat. My inspiration picture is a dark natural with re tort, but I did see a couple dark blues in another thread here today that would do just fine. So Hay Thanks!

Cool! Glad my OSG ramblings occasionally help someone out

If you're considering dark blue I'll just leave these here. My gunmetal blue HH Jag with its black pickguard and an aged mint for comparison's sake. If I ever change things up on that guitar, it'd be to go with mint or parchment. Very sharp against the dark blue. The solid black can be a little low contrast for my taste, depending on the lighting. B/W/B might suit it better, I find the pinstripe effect of the white layer adds a lot of definition on dark colours.





I think that dark/navy blue is one of the most underutilized colours on offsets. It wasn't part of the 60's CCs so it gets ignored, but it looks so good.

I've always been a blue+tort guy, but that combo looks really good. Would love a dark blue Jaguar one day

[s_mcsleazy]

my experience with the wood on squier VM's is lot's of mismatched bits of wood glued together. the actual wood is ok BUT if it's me, i'm just going to go for ash since that's more my speed anyway.

[Lotek]

The gunmetal blue is beautiful. And I think the mint pick guard would look cool on it. You should install it, to see if you prefer it. I've seen photos of dark navy offsets, I agree it is underutilized. Alright, blue it is. Hopefully I will get to pick up the guitar this weekend and see what I'm starting with.