It’s almost inevitable that a guitar will sustain some finish damage sooner or later.
On a new or pristine instrument this is akin to the first door ding on a new car. You know it’s probably going to happen but when it does……….ugh.
I’ve seen some people near tears about a minor scratch on an inconspicuous spot and some players who can shrug off a foot long skid mark on the soundboard. Everyone has a different tolerance level and a different expectation level when it comes to repairing the damage. As any experienced guitar tech will tell you small “spot” repairs have a disconcerting way of growing ever larger.
Before we go further please indulge me a moment. Guitars are tools to make music and as with any tool they will show ordinary wear and evidence of occasional mis-adventure. If you have a little nick or a big dent, or any of the usual assortment of surface blemishes that guitars are prone to try to view it in the perspective of a tool that shows wear. Believe me, virtually no one who is seriously involved in playing or listening to guitars will care even a little bit about some cosmetic flaw in your pride and joy. Making music is the point of these things, the rest is vanity. End of editorial.
Three hundred pages could be written about finish repairs so I’ll just skim the surface of the most common repair requests here.
Light scratches that don’t go through the finish to the wood underneath can usually be buffed out to invisibility.
Deep scratches are dealt with by very careful wet sanding followed by buffing which, like the above can be rendered invisible.
Chips, deep abrasions, fractures; When the damage goes through the finish coats to the wood as in a very deep abrasion or a large chip you have a much more complex and expensive repair which no matter how skillfully executed may remain somewhat visible. The wound can be minimized but probably not made to “go away.” The color and type of finish will dictate the difficulty with these sort of problems.
Solid black or white guitars will be the easiest to repair and any translucent finish will be the hardest. Fender Butterscotch or that gorgeous Gibson dark ruby red are a couple of colors that can drive even a master finisher nuts when it comes to spot repairs.
In those instances when colors need to be matched even the most perfect job may change with the passage of time. Light affects most finishes to some extent often causing some darkening or lightening which can, after some time simply call attention to the original area of damage.
Dings and dents, as long as they’re pretty small, like 1/8″ or so can often be nicely repaired by carefully filling the dent with finish material then level sanding and buffing. Similar to scratches, if the wood underneath the finish ding is not damaged these pesky little dents are fairly easy to deal with. Darker colors and woods are somewhat more forgiving than pale soundboards or see-through colors.
Cracks are always partnered up with finish damage. Crack repair is a fairly involved topic with regard to the structural aspect alone. Cosmetic finish repair over the crack is a complication. Light colored spruce soundboard cracks are frequently quite hard to render invisible. I generally let customers know that while the crack can be stabilized and be structurally sound there will probably be some sort of lingering evidence of trauma even with finish repair. Often I recommend against even attempting finish repair over cracks.
Expectations and reality don’t always mesh nicely. When I tell customers what to expect on finish repairs I try hard to make sure their expectations are in line with with what can really be done. This brings to mind the little quote I have pinned up over one of my benches here at TGW. “Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn’t have to do it himself”.
Refinish or repair is often the question. Frequently with a solid body such as a Strat or Tele there are so many small finish problems that a refin is a reasonable way to go. Major refinish work on most acoustic guitars is more problematic but is not the “no-no” that some would have you believe.
In the next blog post I’ll cover the subject of complete and partial refinishing in more detail.