Guitar Nerds Anonymous

That looks boss. I like the Glendale but that is a cool thing.

I have a humble Gotoh but that does look tasty. Nice.

Spent the whole of a 5 hour teams meeting on mute scraping and sanding the cracked sticky poly finish off my USA tele’s neck. Don’t think I’ve ruined it. Time will tell.

It's been bugging me for years. The poly finish was sprayed over the frets from the factory and had chipped in a few places. It had developed two or three big length-ways cracks on the back and a light sanding didn't help as I could still feel them. Plus where the finish had started to lift from the fingerboard the dot markers had gone all opaque like a creepy milky white eyeballs. I was restringing after the I Want You (She's So Heavy) string bend snappage this morning and just decided to go for it. As soon as a couple chips pinged off from around the dot markers I realised how thick it was... bit intimidating but I went at it with a stanley blade, 150, 240 and 255 paper and seem to have got most of it off. Had to hoover myself down several times during proceedings.

I reckon it needs another pass with some finer paper or wire wool and an oil finish but overall, I think it's ok.

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After I took those pics I rubbed it down with Wood Silk beeswax furniture polish which is advertised as "no silicon, no water, just wax and essential oils". Which I thought would be fine till I get hold of some lemon oil. After I did It I read the small print which says "do not spray on unfinished wood, especially scratches or light coloured wood". Whoops. I guess it's only because it might darken the colour which is fine by me. Looking okay so far.

Oh good work! I should do that to my Strat neck. I hate the sticky feeling compared to the Tru Oil finish on the Tele.

Ta. Just ordered some tru oil.

Oh and yes, it does need a refret. At some point.

Cool! - lots of very thin coats worked for me. I'd do 3 or 4 then knock it back with wire wool. I think I did around 20 in total, then a good buffing to finish.

We all want a good buffing to finish

Nice work!

While you're in there you could take some very fine steel wool and polish the frets? I always like proper shiny frets.

If you're working over unfinished maple though, make sure to tape off the fretboard before doing this. All of it.

Gretsch arriving today ..
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Oooh, much excite!!

Advice please, fellow nerds... I need/want a work mat and neck pillow/support... What should I be buying? Don't like the Dunlop system, mat seems too small and the support is over fussy... This Music Nomad setup is the best/cheapest thing I can seem to find ($70 posted), any other options I should be looking at? Don't mind spending a bit more for something that'll last...

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don't know if they do mats but Crimson Guitars do some very nice looking wooden neck rests. On his youtube videos the guy seems to just use a bit of old yoga mat.

I'd recommend that approach too.
The neck rest looks nice and well made and any old (but free of debris) mat will do.

I use whatever's lying about, usually a towel and rolled up pair of jeans under the neck. Endlessly adjustable. But if you have some precious guitars I get the need for something a bit fancier.

How much?!? 😂

That looks a bit luxe, a bit of old cork would do me fine... 🤑

In other news... Been searching for some replacement tuners for Flame Guitar for months and months, was about to buy the reissues then just found half an original set for sale 20kms down the road!! Pretty happy, was only gonna replace the two worst ones but now I can swap out all the crooked ones... $90 posted for three, and all in much better nick than the ones on there...

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How much?!? 😂

Well you did say:

Don't mind spending a bit more for something that'll last...

That looks like it'll last and its pretty!

Nice find with the tuners.

Did you blend the sanding towards the top and bottom of the neck? I want to do the same to an old strat neck but don’t know if I should sand it all off or just the back and fret board and blend the where the two finishes meet?

You're quite right, I did say that, it just looks a bit fancy and exotic... Funny how little choice there appears to be for this stuff where I am, I would love to jump onto StewMac and get something from there but the postage is just silly...

At the risk of angering hippy, I am often surprised when trying to arrange stuff for my mother-in-law at how difficult it can be to arrange deliveries within Australia, and I'm talking Melbourne not some of the more backwards parts of the country where men are men and ......... etc.

Getting stuff to her from here is positively backwards, I can understand the cost but when you pay that much and it still takes weeks (minimum) to arrive its frustrating.

AusPost is the fucking worst, it normally takes longer for stuff to get to me from Sydney than it does from London...

Condolences on behind married to a Victorian... 🙃

Finally getting round to finishing a telecaster I started about three years ago...

I love using copper tape to shield - it's not as smooth or neat as carbon paint, but looks so nice in the cavities - like a little future surprise to anyone that works on it down the line.

Should be finished with this one tomorrow - just soldering to go.

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