CA glue darkens wood..

[Palle Clausen]

So, I tried my first attempt at drop filling a chip in a spruce top with CA glue.

Not so good...

The CA darkens the wood so that it is very visible compared to the surrounding wood :-(

Any tips on how to make it less noticeable?

Thank you.

[Roger Häggström]

Not an easy task. You will probably need to fill the chip with some matching spruce for a good color match, CA glue will always make the wood or wood dust darker. On a pale spruce top it will be visible. HHG would be a better choice for gluing the chip. Sometimes with dark wood you can get a good match using lighter colored wood dust as a filler. With rosewood and ebony the result can be invisible.You should do some experimenting on the side using matching wood before doing it for real.

[Greg Mirken]

The same thing happens with lacquer. The broken wood fibers act as sponges and suck up the material. I thin Titebond or hide glue, whichever is handy, with water to make a thin sizing. This is painted on the damaged area and allowed to dry. This seals the torn fibers and eliminates, or at least minimizes, the discoloration.

[Roger Häggström]

Great tip, I will try that one next time! Another obvious thing is to clean the bare wood to get it as light as possible.

[Palle Clausen]

Thanks guys.

Lesson learned, will try the glue/water trick next time.

[Ned Knepp]

Ok, I'll bite. Why were you drop filling on  bare wood? 

 I'm not trying to start anything I'm just wondering if I'm missing a technique that I could have been using for all this time.

 

[Palle Clausen]

It was a chip in the lacquer on an old Morris acoustic. The chip was down to bare wood.

A complete refinish wouldn't make sense considering the value of the guitar (even though it is a very high quality guitar).