Aging Necks: What i've done

Hello readers! sorry I haven't brought you this sooner. In my last post I said I had done a little aging to my neck and I have pictures to show you what I have done. The neck is from a '04 Fender Mexican Telecaster. Sorry for the quality of the pictures I took the pictures with my phone, if I can get better quality pictures will post them of my neck. As I mentioned before, the neck has some natural aged because the guitar is about 8 years old. The bigger the finish is worn is the work that i have done.

natural age and waring of the neck

"artificial" aging

That is the Natural aging and waring of the finish on the neck

a little artificial waring at the neck joint area

Natural/slightly worked artificial aging of the neck

I hope you enjoyed of what i have been working on and good luck with your work as well.

Aged Necks

Practically every guitar ages over a period of time. But one of the first things to age is the neck whether it be on the fretboard or the back of the neck.

Heavily aged Fender Strat neck

1957 Reissue Fender Neck

 To get that aged look on the back of a Fender neck is really really really easy. You only need very fine sandpaper. It really all depends on where you have your hand most because your hand is going to play a big part in this. What you wanna do is sand down the finish where you place your hand the most. If you really want to you can sand down the whole neck. You then want to play your guitar as you normally do but don't wash your hands. The dirt sweat and grime in your hands will be absorbed into the wood. It's probably the simplest way to age the neck of your guitar. I actually did do a little bit of this method on my Mexican Fender Telecaster and it looks very real. It had already started
the aging progress around the edges. But i sped up the process of it. I will post pictures of my Tele's neck in another post.
please leave a comment or a question

How To Age and Ware Your Finish

There is always that one point in time where you wanted to take your Strat or Les Paul and ware down the finish on them to show arm ware, buckle rash, and belly ware.

What you're going to need is Sandpaper (medium and fine), very, fine, steel wool and lastly, a steady hand.

What you want to do is sand down the finish off the area you want ware to show with the medium grit sandpaper. Then you want to sand down that same area with the fine sandpaper just to smooth things out. Now if you want to keep it light and show minimal ware use the fine sand paper instead of using the medium grit and transferring to the fine grit. After that you want to dust off your finish and check your work and see if you're happy with it. You then want to take your steel wool and rub it on the rest of the finish. You want to rub in circles because that will get the job quicker and show less scratches on the finish from the steel wool. After that you should be done. But wait! what about the buckle rash? Well, here's my tip to you. You can either play your guitar with a big belt buckle on, or you can do the Tom Murphy method, which is to take your keys and a few other materials made of metal and drop them on the back where the belt buckle would be. This will simulate buckle ware. I hope you succeed with this and Good Luck.

Antiquity Pickups

Have you ever wanted to have aged pickups, But you didn't want to age them yourself? There are pickup companies that make aged pickups that are new. Companies like Seymour Duncan make these pickups and are sold everywhere like your local guitar shops. These pickups are made for Les Paul's, Strat's, Tele's, and even basses. These pickups have the vintage sound from the 50's and 60's and have the aged look from over the years.

Seymour Duncan's Antiquity Gold Humbuckers

The magnets in the pickups are Alnico II magnets. Though they are a bit pricey, $174, they bring that vintage sound from old 50's and 60's Les Paul's and SG's

Seymour Duncan's JB/Jazz Antiquity Humbuckers

The JB and Jazz antiquity Humbuckers look like they have been worn and played over the course of many years. Their look and sound originates from the 1970's era with it's rich harmonics, clarity, and sustain with the looks of oxidization, dust, and sweat.

Seymour Duncan's Nickle Antiquity Humbucker

Now that you've seen the humbuckers, are you curious about the single coils? Lets start with thir Strat line of pickups.

Seymour Duncan's Antiquity II Custom Bridge, Surfer

Now this pickup is the Antiquity II custom surfer pickup. This pickup was designed for people who want that 60's surfer tone in a strat.

Seymour Duncan's Texas Hot Custom

This pickup is made to sound like a 50's Strat but with an extra punch in the tone. The pickup's image has aged magnets and aged pickup covers.
Next are Telecaster pickups. Some of these pickups come in sets of 2, for both neck and bridge pickups.

Seymour Duncan's Antiquity II Tele Pickups

These pickups were designed to look like they came from a 60's Telecaster. They are also dipped in wax to reduce feedback with more modern effects as well.

Seymour Duncan also makes antiquity pickups for specialized guitars. These pickups are mini humbuckers, both standard and for the Firebird model by Gibson. Pickups for Fender Jaguars, Jazzmasters, and Mustangs are made.The P90 is also produced. The P90's come in both soapbar and in Dog-Ear. There are many more models of pickups and some parts in the Antiquity line but these are only some of what they have. I really do suggest checking them out for that vintage tone and image that you may be looking for. Check them out at seymourduncan.com.

Leave any Comments or questions you may have in the comment box. 

Aged and Worn Finishes

As every guitarist knows, finishes ware down from playing the instrument over time. From Fender to Gibson to PRS to any other guitar company, the guitar finish will ware down over time from playing it. Why does this happen? Well think about it, a persons sweat and grime get on the finish which will eat away at the finish over time. That's why guitar finishes ware down over time. Look at Eddie Van Halen's Franken Strat

EVH Frankenstrat Replica

The exact replica of Eddie Van Halen's Frankenstrat came out in 2009. Notice the slight ware around where the arm would be and the back area where the spring cavity is.
Slash's signature Les Paul's are also aged in the custom shop and show the arm ware and nicks of where slash put his arm.

Gibson Custom Shop Slash Les Paul

Come to mind Neil Young's 1953 Gibson Les Paul has an aged finish. The finish has lost its shine and luster and has arm wear. Why? It's Neil's main axe.

Neil Young's 1953 Gibson Les Paul "Old Black"

There is a lot of ware on this Les Paul. As you can see the ware is where the arm is placed, above the strings and under the strings. The back has a lot of ware as well as you notice in the picture below.

As you can see there is a TREMENDOUS amount of ware on the neck and around the sides of the body. Many musicians have guitars that are aged. Then the company of guitar the person is using will take that guitar and mass produce it. The companies will age it and they will go for thousands of dollars. It's quite the interesting market because many people like Tom Murphy and Gary Moore get paid to age guitars, as I mentioned in a few previous posts.

comments? questions? suggestions?

Yes I am open to suggestions! leave them in the comment box!!!

Rare, aged, and vintage Fender's?

Much like Gibson guitars many people are also wondering what rare fender guitars are out there and whether they should get them in a aged condition or find one in mint condition.
  Everyone loves a Fender guitar whether it be a Stratocaster, Telecaster, Mustang and many others. But what about the RARE models from fender. One of the most rarest Fender guitars is The Fender Coronado

This hollow body guitar came out in 1967. Another rare Fender guitar is The Fender Bass VI.

Though it is a bass, many guitarists play this bass as well as bassists.
Even though this guitar is more recent, many collectors are searching more for it because it is becoming a rare guitar.

The Fender Jag-Stang. This Mustang/Jaguar hybrid was designed by the Grunge legend, Kurt Cobain, this guitar came out in 1993. The value of this is increasing because it's becoming very rare and hard to find.
If you're looking for rare Fender's and you find some of these in a little aged condition or mint, get them if you have the chance. They are great guitars and the playability in these guitars are amazing. There is no question if you should or shouldn't if they're aged or not.

Thank you

comments/questions?

How to Age Pickup Pole Pieces for Telecasters

Have you ever been working on your Telecaster and wanted you pickup pole pieces to look really old and aged? Well the process for this is quite simple.

All you need is an aluminum oxidizer and a Q-tip.

What yo need to do is take your Q=tip and dip it in the oxidizer

Then rub the oxidizer on the pole pieces.

Now what this will do is make the pole pieces black, which happens a lot on telecaster bridge pickups. You should be done after rubbing them on all 6 pole pieces. Hope this helped you, Good Luck.

leave a comment or a question