Getting stain out of maple neck?

Nope. You can try bleaching it and you can try sanding it, but removing it completely without altering the wood is a no-go.

The reason you got uneven results is because pretty much every neck maker that sells 'unfinished' necks applies a thin seal coat to help keep the wood stable and reduce handling marks. Very few bare necks sold are actually bare.

 

I’ve never been able to. It seems like maple is one and done with stain.

 

the only way I know of:

 

"what’s the worst case scenario with bleaching it?"


There are wood bleaching solutions available (check in the paint department) but they are all hit and miss. Generally they affect the look of the grain an give it a washed-out appearance. And they never really remove all the stain.

It's called "stain" for a reason


There are botched finishing attempts all over Reverb and Fleabay. If you're up for wacky adventures and don't mind non-standard appearances of wood, you can often get quite a deal.

 

Tip: Don't stain maple. Leave it natural or color it tinted lacquer. You apply a clear lacquer to seal the wood and then apply the lacquer toner or tinted lacquer. If you don't like the result it's completely reversible because the clear lacquer seal coat keeps the dye in the tinted lacguer from being absorbed.

Here's a neck that I applied clear followed by ReRanch's banana yellow Neck Amber. I hated it so after it dried, I took a scotchbrite and removed the banana color and gave it a light coat of ReRanch "Burst Amber" which doesn't go so yellow. No drama, an easy fix.

 

I get better results on Maple with dye vs. Stain . As far as removing it, pretty unlikely. Sand it down and dye darker

 

Re-Ranch's neck amber is just an aerosol dye, not a "finish," like a stain is. It is only designed to work on bare wood, not over finish. It would indeed look like hell sprayed over clear coat and allowed to dry, like the way you did it. It would be "cartoony" looking, and would likely not have a consistent translucency across the entire neck. If you had done the Neck Amber first, then clear coated it, it would have looked quite classy and authentic.

Maple is a great wood for taking dyes and stains. If there are problems, it's only because the wood was not properly prepared beforehand.