The enjoyment of cleaning a guitar, amp or pedal....

Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2013 4:58 pm

One of the great pleasures I take is in detailing a guitar or amp or pedal when it arrives at my home. I'm talking about used equipment.

I bring the item in my office/man cave and bring out the detailing tools and go to work.

I'm especially pleased when I get the item from Craigslist or eBay at a low price because of the condition, but it works great. Then after some tlc and elbow grease it looks much much better. Occasionally it looks so good that when its time to sell I get more than I paid.

Makes me feel good.

Thanks for listening....

Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2013 5:56 pm

Sweet dude! Got any cool before and after pics of a scenario like that?

Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2013 10:17 pm

I wish I did but I don't ;(

Joined: 15 Sep 2010 Posts: 976 Location: Rock Hill,SC

why don't you divulge your process step by step? We have a few new guys around & plus it'll make for a good read. I know I've learned quite a bit from this forum over the years.

Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2013 11:56 pm

Sure thing.

For guitars I remove the strings first and use a soft cloth to wipe everything down to get off loose debris and grime. I use canned air to blow around all the pickups and electronics. Then some fretboard conditioner applied twice for good measure. I have a fender instrument care kit that has 3 bottles. The first is a cleaner that I spray on a bounty paper towel and apply to all the finished surfaces of the instrument. Then wipe down with a microfiber cloth. Then the swirl and haze remover is applied with a sponge to the same surfaces. This can remove light scratches. Then this is wiped off with same microfiber cloth. The last step is the polish and conditioner which leave a nice smooth shiny finish. It's applied with the sponge and wiped with microfiber cloth. The fender kit is made by meguiers and is good quality.

If the pots are scratchy I spray them with deoxit.

New strings are applied and tuned.

Done.

For amps I do basically the same thing.

For vintage guitar pedals with chrome the best thing I have found for cleaning and shining chrome is to take aluminum foil and crumple it up into a tight wad and rub it on the chrome. It's amazing how well this works.

After the chrome is cleaned I use turtle wax chrome and metal polish to do final shine and protect.

For old pedals like the fender wah's that have the rubber tread I use armor all to shine up the rubber.

I keep qtips, cotton rolls and an old toothbrush handy to get into any dirty nooks and crannies that need cleaning.

I also have some different colored permanent markers that I got from staples do touch up work. Like to hide paint scratches.

That's about it.

When I was a kid I liked detailing cars and would go door to door looking for business. I think instrument detailing is just my current incarnation of that.

I hope I didn't bore anybody with this.

If you have other suggestions on this topic please chime in.

Joined: 15 Dec 2008 Posts: 4252 Location: Derry, N Ireland

Very cool man!! I found myself buying guitars, giving them some TLC and selling them on for profit. I think the best one I did was I got a grubby black Ibanez RG350m for £100, I spent an evening or 2 cleaning it and setting it up and sold it a week later for £200.

There is something therapeutic about spending time on am instrument! Cool

Posted: Sun Mar 10, 2013 12:58 am

Definitely therapeutic. My kids like to watch/ help too.

I let them rub the aluminum foil.

Joined: 28 Jan 2007 Posts: 4749 Location: Indiana

nippyjun wrote:

One of the great pleasures I take is in detailing a guitar or amp or pedal when it arrives at my home. I'm talking about used equipment.

I bring the item in my office/man cave and bring out the detailing tools and go to work.

I'm especially pleased when I get the item from Craigslist or eBay at a low price because of the condition, but it works great. Then after some tlc and elbow grease it looks much much better. Occasionally it looks so good that when its time to sell I get more than I paid.

Makes me feel good.

Thanks for listening....

I'm with you.

Kind of like taking in a sad pathetic homeless stray, showing it some love, and it transforms into something great!