word of advice!!!!

hi guys,

well.. as u all know i have been attempting to relic my axe... and to start with all was going fine...

i was only wanting the hardware aged not the actual finish of the guitar...

and well my friend gave me this stuff that is for rubbing metal down to prepare it for painting...

this stuff worked a treat for rubbing down my hardware to give it an aged effect....

anyway when i first started this aging process i had the parts off the guitar... but i still wasnt at all happy with the tailpiece finish i thought it still needed to be rubbed down somemore....


so stupid me thought "there wont be any harm just rubbing the tailpiece down while shes still attached to the guitar"

oh what a stupid mistake that was!!!!!

the stuff i got from my friend ( i forget what its called) it looks like those green scouring pads u get for washing up dishes except this stuff is brown and a hell of a lot more abbrasive!!!!

well now the once beautiful red quilt top is now covered in circular scratches!!!

i thought to myself well maybe if i just lightly scratch the entire top it wouldnt look as bad.....

how wrong was i????

im to ashamed to take pics at the moment.... but when i get over this ( which shouldnt be to long as i am hopefully getting a new LS150 tommorow so long as my college bursary clears) i will take pics of her to give u all a laugh!!!!

when i get this new LS150 i can safely say that nothing like this will be performed on her!!!!

shes gonna just get aged naturally!!!

i wish to hell i never started this stupid relicing idea on my once pretty LS85Q!!!

ah well u live and learn.... though all thru my life i have always learnt things the hard way!!!!!!!


who put the idea into my head to do this to my axe??

come on own up who was it!!!!!!


Dave

get some Meguiars car polishing compound, not the wax but the polishing compound, sometimes called "fine cut cleaner."

Try polishing the whole guitar out with that, it may take a little work, but you MIGHT be able to save it. Let us know.

Hi Dave,

I think that pad you describe is a Scotchbrite pad, used for rubbing down car paintwork. If you have used this on the gloss surface with any force at all you are F****d.
I used to be in the Motor trade and will have a look of it tomorrow, all being well You might be able to buff it out I'll tell you when I see it.
Don't rub anymore tonight (well not the guitar anyway)

Les

thanks guys... Les ill see u tommorow hopefully u can buff this out for me!!!!!!

im just glad that im gonna be gettin ur 150 otherwise i would be even more annoyed!!!!!


Dave

Mine is ful of circular scratches when ithe light hits it at some direction.

Maybe nor as bad but mabe i used an abrasive cloth without noticing, would some Dunlop Formula Wax give it an original luster?
________
Marijuana Vaporizer

guitar polish doesn't do much in my experience. Car polish works best. THis is a trick I learned from a vintage guitar dealer.

THis stands to reason, as all the original Fender and Gibson custom colors were made from automotive paint anyhow.

i havent heard anything good about that dunlop stuff... a lot of people told me that the stuff doesnt remove any scratches???

never had any first hand experience with it myself though....

nah this guitar is gettin left for Les(mercman) to check her out hopefully he can bring the finish back to normal....

LS85Q is poly finished, right? If so, this isnt going to buff out. Its going to have to stripped and refinished. No way around it. The good news is that stripping the poly off and going with a nitro laquer will let the guitar breathe and it will sound better. Plus, you can now have a Les Paul in any color you want.

You already know how I feel about relics from the other thread, but if you still want a relic'ed guitar, send it to RS Guitarworks for the refinish work. they can do it right.

good luck.

chrislpp said:

Mine is ful of circular scratches when ithe light hits it at some direction.

Maybe nor as bad but mabe i used an abrasive cloth without noticing, would some Dunlop Formula Wax give it an original luster?

Click to expand...

If there are any scratches in the finish polish won't work, car or otherwise. You will need a cutting agent. If the scratches are very faint/light you might get away with something like "T CUT" but remember that the Poly finish on a guitar is very thin and to much rubbing will go through the finish.

BE VERY CAREFUL

Les

Not terribly useful, but "I told you so..."

If it could do that to a near-invincible poly finish, then just be glad that the finish wasn't nitro!

shuie said:

LS85Q is poly finished, right? If so, this isnt going to buff out. Its going to have to stripped and refinished. No way around it. The good news is that stripping the poly off and going with a nitro laquer will let the guitar breathe and it will sound better. Plus, you can now have a Les Paul in any color you want.
good luck.

Click to expand...

but i cant have my pretty quilted top coz its just veneer if i strip the finish right down the veneer must gome off also because they are so thin....

not to worry my college grant comes thru tommorow and Les's 150 will be mine!!

u serious that this very very light surface scratches wont come off a poly finish with T cut???

if tthis is the case i am just gonna give the whole ttop a light rub with the scotchbrite pad until it goes dull all over...

i lightly rubbed a bit on the back of the body beside the neck joint, and it just gives the poly finish a dull matt kinda effect which i kinda like...

but i will try polishing them out first though.....

Dave

try polishing. It might work.

Paladin2019 said:

Not terribly useful, but "I told you so..."

If it could do that to a near-invincible poly finish, then just be glad that the finish wasn't nitro!

Click to expand...

had i only listened to what other people said huh???

oh well....

i cant get the scuffs to show up in pics for some reason...

in pictures the guitar still looks mint????

i tried turning the flash off and taking pics at different angles... just cant get em to show???

polishing should take these scuffs out they are very very light so im sure that an abrassive like T Cut will get em out...

The veneer is not going to come off if you strip the finish.

Why don't you either sell the guitar as is or take it to someone that has a clue about what they are doing before you damage it further?

Okay, now I know I'm probably approaching this from a totally different perspective from some of you but indulge me if you will and help me to establish some fundamental points, please.

We love guitars, right? In particular, we're devotees of Tokai, a company which over the years has established a reputation for making wonderful replicas of classic guitars, yes? We like them for their build quality, their playability, their sound and their attention to detail, agreed? We try to look after them and keep them in cases when transporting them, correct?

Why, then, would you desecrate, sorry "relic", such an instrument?!!
Are you a secret G***** agent trying to discredit Tokai?!! Aren't Epiphones good enough for your 'modern art' activities?!! Is this act a political statement?!! Am I sounding like John Cleese yet?!!

All melodramatics aside, I have no understanding of why one person's idea of cherishing their guitars is to try and prevent mishaps from occurring in their vicinity and someone else's is to do their utmost to make it look like it has.

On a slightly flippant final note, you wanted it to look "relic'd", which from what I gather is making an instrument look like it's sustained accidental damage over the years. Accidents by their very nature are not neat or predictable. It could be said that your guitar is now genuinely "relic'd" as it would seem it's not how you intended it to be. That, Alanis, is ironic.

no need for the harsh comments shocker or shuie...

its only the finish thats getting damaged not the actual guitar shuie.... in no way is surface scratches and dulling of hardware gonna affect my guitars tone.... its still gonna sound the same...

it jsut wont look like every other Les Paul... thats the general idea of relicing IMO to give the axe some character....

i happen to love my guitars... and also love tokais as a brand... i play 5 to 6 hours a day... ive been playing for 13 years....

i just dont like my equipment looking lets say new i thought i would try relicing my guitar and well things didnt go as planned!!!

i didnt create this thread for assholes like u 2 to critisize me for what i have done to MY guitar.....

i created it just to show what can happen when an inexperienced person trys to age a guitar... so as for others not to make the same **** mistake...


shuie wtf is the problem with u???

any thread i seem to make that u have posted on has been to critisize me... i have no time for people like u.....

further more i want a guitar that sounds/feels good to play why would i want to own an epiphone???

i learnt to play on a epiphone LPstandard... really nasty sounding things that feel like they were built out of balsa wood!!!!

keep your nasty comments to yourself....


Dave

well we can cool it down but I'll just say that I got a kick out of this thread, LRR is definitely a grown-up to admit his mistakes.

As far as the relic-ing question, I sort of agree that it doesn't make sense to me. I also don't subscribe to the "i must prevent every little scratch" philosophy. I just play my guitars and don't stress about anything and let the chips fall where they may.

BUT a man's (or woman's) guitar is his or her own personal instrument and it's your own personal choice what to do with it obviously.

I bet we've all done dumb things to guitars, no matter how much we love them. I once got home from a gig really tired late at night and left my prized lake placid blue/matching headstock, factory gold hardware 1962 jazzmaster in the car, with the windows rolled up... I was living in Texas at the time and the temp. got over 100 degrees farenheit the next day... it was already 5 PM or so before I realized what I had done. Luckily I lived in a decent neighborhood so the guitar was still there, but I was scared about what that kind of extreme heat would do to what I have always thought happens to be the best neck I've ever played on a guitar!

I took it out of the car and inside the apartment and immediately loosened all the strings to complete slack, and went instantly to my guitar tech. He said that I saved it by loosening the strings and taking tension off the neck, but it didn't feel the same after that... I had it re-set up and it was playable but not as good as before, finally I told the tech to just start all over again with the setup.. take the neck off and just completely start again. After that, it was fine, even better than before!

All's well that ends well in that case. Hope your love rock mishap turns out similarly rosy. Good luck.

LoveRelicsRule, Im not really sure what Ive done since you posted this thread to torque you off. I guess you are still a little salty over the comments I made before you relic'ed the guitar :roll:

Anyway, you're a better man than me for admitting in a public forum that you actually did something like this so I've kept the 'I told you so' comments to myself. Its great that you are sharing this experience so someone else can learn from it.

Well, I wish you luck with buffing the scratches out of that polyurethane finish. More Abrasives. Brilliant! Just remember: Wax on, wax off. Here's a little inspiration:



BTW, Balsa, while very expensive and difficult to work with, is actually very resonant and makes a great lightweight tonewood.