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Excuse me if I named that wrong. The clear finishing resin. Has anybody ever used it to harden a top?

I am assuming you mean the West system 105 resin and the 207 clear hardener. I have used it for pore fill but never on a top. I put as little as I can get away with on a top.

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I always use west systems (what I use for my pore fill) on my top. I use a water based finish and the epoxy adds depth to the wood that it otherwise lacks under a water based lacquer. Just keep it as thin as possible.

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Curious Mike, as to why you would want to harden the top...not sure I understand the benefits.

I'm guessing you topped a solid body with something that dents too easily. Many years ago I had a friend top a LP style guitar with a beautiful piece of figure sinker redwood. He "hardened" it with CA glue. I'm sure he lost some brain cells, and he says it was a mess, but it worked! Looked beautiful and didn't seem to dent easily.
I think CA glue penetrates better than epoxy, so I'm not sure you'd get the same results.


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Ok. Fair enough. I'm not trying to pore fill the top. I want to add a level of hardness to the top. Almost any spruce top is soft when unfinished. My thought was to use thinned clear epoxy to soak in some small distance and harden the top without changing the appearance or (hopefully) the tonal qualities. And, I would never try CA for this as it can do bad color things to spruce. Maybe, it cannot soak in far enough to matter. Guess an experiment is called for.

There are a couple of reasons to put a coat of epoxy over a top. The first reason involves waterborne finishes. Waterbornes, unlike any of the solvent based finishes, bonds to the top surface of the wood, whereas traditional lacquers, varnishes, shellac, polyurethanes and polyester all sink into the top few thousands and case harden the top. Consequently, these solvent based finishes do a better job of protecting the top than a waterborne on its own.

Another reason is that waterbornes don't pop the color and figure probably because the oils and resins in woods are oil soluble and dissolve only in oil or solvents. Putting a coat of epoxy pops the figure.

You don't want to think of it as building a finish, rather, just sealing the top with the epoxy to then be top coated with your finish of choice.

I would think it would deaden the top as well and you'd have an instrument that might be harder to dent but not sound as good.

Thanks Dave. To others, I honestly don't understand how u can say without evidence it would deaden the top. I'm not talking about caking it on like Tammy Faye Baker's makeup. More like what Dave was talking about. Just enough to crystallize the top layer of wood fibers. If it pops the grain, all the better. If Taylor-like polyester finish doesn't deaden a top, what I'm talking about wont even come close.