Quick-Fix: Re-Spraying Your Guitar
How to paint a guitar in the colour of your choice.
There are several different ways to paint a guitar. For this website I’m going to be concentrating on the easiest way, and if anyone out there wants to have a go at painting their own guitar you’d be better following this easy way rather than a complicated one.
DISCLAIMER: This guide is not exhaustive in the slightest. I have provided this as a quick reference as to how to paint a guitar. For fuller, more in-depth guidance, try ordering the e-books from paintyourownguitar.com, they’re fantastic. Also, my links page shows websites which have more comprehensive guidance. I will not be held responsible for anyone who does not achieve their desired finish.
Step 1
Take the gloss lacquered finish off of the guitar. As you can see in this picture, the sheen has been removed.
Step 2
You need to sand the body down so that the primer will stick evenly to the body (and not run off the sheen), and then the paint sticks 
to the primer. The advantage with using aerosols is that they’re cheaper than a professional spray gun and readily available – you can get them from most shops that sell bits for cars, as car spray paint is the same stuff!
Tip: To avoid doing what I had to do (I had to paint in my garage due to the ‘great’ British weather…) suspend the guitar body from a washing line or similar, using a bit of wire through the neck holes. This way you can walk around the guitar and get both sides of the guitar done at once.
Leave this to dry then build up another couple of coats, until you have a grey, matt-finish guitar.
Step 3
Sand the body, start spraying the paint
Tip: Do not worry if your first couple of coats do not seem to be matching to the colour you bought. They will react with the primer (and also the colour underneath) and probably give you a lighter coat. This will disappear with every coat you apply. Remember you will probably need five or six coats to achieve a full, gloss finish.
The following pictures show the colour differences between coats – the first picture is after only two coats, 
the second is after five. (This is the guitar from project-strat.com)
Painted. Notice the difference in colour between coats (the more coats the deeper the colour).
Step 4
Once you have applied the final coat, and the finish is to your liking, leave to dry overnight. Tip: If you are planning on applying any custom decals to the guitar, you may wish to apply them now, so that they will be under the lacquer.
At this stage it needs to be clear coated. When this is finished, and you have applied the final coat of lacquer, leave this to dry for a day or two. Once this has dried, pick it up and admire your work. Congratulations! You have painted your guitar body.
Van Halen build notes
As my guitar was going to be a replica of Eddie Van Halen’s guitar, there are details to note. The nature of the design means that I had to use 2 different colours, black and white. In order to paint this successfully I had to buy black and white spray paint cans, and different types of masking tape. The tape widths were 3/4 inch for the wider stripes and 1/8 inch for the thinner black stripes. I managed to buy a roll of 3/4 inch tape, but for the 1/8 inch tape I had to go to my local model shop and purchased yellow ‘Tamiya’ masking tape which I used to make model kits with when I was younger (this still had to be cut down to size however).
After sanding down the body of my guitar, I applied the primer and around 5-7 coats of black paint. Make sure it covers fully and you get one uniform colour and sheen. The next day I applied the masking tape, pressing down firmly to secure it in place and prevent paint running under it. After that I applied around 7 coats of white paint. I was actually surprised by how well the white paint covered, in my experience with enamel paint, white was always a real pain in the ass to use.
I left the guitar with no gloss finish like the original, but now I regret doing so. It is important to protect the finish in addition to making it look glossy. Logos from T-shirts I’ve worn while playing have rubbed against the finish of the guitar and left some sort of green residue, and is incredibly hard to get out. The guitar also gets dented easier. If you feel you can live with that however and want to go for originality, by all means do so.
Now all that remains is to put in a maple neck, a black scratch-plate (pick guard) and a Seymour Duncan custom E.V.H pickup for that authentic Van Halen look and sound.
(Thanks to project-strat for information for the article)
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Using enamel is your first mistake. And anything over 4 coats will suffocate the piece, it needs to breath period. nitrocellulose lacquer, everything else is shit. I’m a musician, auto painter, and wildlife artist, 60 yrs old and have read every piece of crap scrawls on how Tao’s for years stick to lacquer, seal the bare wood that has been sanded with 2000, seal with a lacquer primer, put enough on to cover the wood let dry 1-2 hrs wet sand down until you can see where you might take all the primer off and stop. Now the lacquer primer has bonded to the wood , now put two heavy coats on and wet sand again drawing from the experience of the first sanding you can and have to guess to remove one coat the closer to the wood the better. let dry over night tack with a tack cloth and apply color, color coats are thinner, now heres the trick let the first color coat dry, over night then wet sand with 678 or 900 wet dry tack add final coats 3 should do let dry over night wet sand 678-900 just skiff the surface using a flat sanding board, I just use my metal diamond fret leveler and tape the paper to it try to get one of the coats off let dry and hand buff, M rubbing compound is the best that I have found its not as abrasive as all the others so it cuts a little slower but a hell of a lot better. In this stage take your time, when you have done all you can with the M (and it will tell you when to stop and thats why I love the stuff) go to a turtle wax polishing compound very fine stuff clean and leave alone DO NOT WAX WAX IS A SEALER AND YOUR PIECE WONT BREATH. I also put mine in the oven off and on fore a few days on very low heat no hotter than a hot summer day because alto of guitars out there are cut by machines sealed with ploy f______urethane you might as well use barn paint if you go that rough. take your time, take your time. Set up so you can rotate it in front of you, this is a fine piece of wood you have give it some attention. Also the neck has to fit snug no paint in the neck cavity teak oil after checking tolerances 0 tolerance. I take my steel flat bar with 400 wood sand paper not wet and dry and skiff the surface of the bottom of the cavity, take a pencil and cover the bottom of the cavity BE CAREFUL take some plastic from a milk carton and use it for a bumper in the front of the cavity so you dont bang dints in it 0 tolerance is the goal, a ton of tone is transfered throngh this cavity TAKE YOUR TIME you might want to build the header (the front barrier closest to the pickup in the neck position 1-16 or 1-64 thousandths to fill here and sand find a small hardwood trim board with the sand paper (400) on the face portion to sand the filler because it has rounded edges and is better (less gouging) use carpenters wood filler by Elmers it is finer and any fine filler will work. check the screws set the neck and you should be just a fraction foreward and this will draw up forward toward the head. They say the best is the natural wood but your not going to find that on one guitar in the known universe Elmers will transfer tone. Get the cavity right and its like a neck through that you can take off and go kick some ass on the weekend unless your playin have fun lioke thissight
Zombiwolf