stripping a neck

[FLHX]

I have a neck with a clear coat on the fretboard. Would it be wise to remove it or leave it alone?

[Tig]

I'd keep the clear coat, but change the surface texture to a satin type finish.
0000 steel wool has been suggested, but maybe someone else can verify this.

[Zip]

Tig's suggestion works fine, but you'll need to pay attention to the frets and mask off the body....especially the pickups (magnets love steel). Bigger question is why? There's a small benefit to deglossing the back of the neck, but the fretboard?? What are you looking to gain?

[Spudman]

What type of guitar/neck is it? Bolt on or set neck?

[FLHX]

It's a bolt on. I don't know what I want to gain. It's the only guitar I have with a glossy fretboard. I didn't know if there was an advantage or not.

[Bookkeeper's Son]

If the fingerboard is maple, it'll really show the dirt if it's unfinished.

[Tig]

Tig's suggestion works fine, but you'll need to pay attention to the frets and mask off the body....especially the pickups (magnets love steel). Bigger question is why? There's a small benefit to deglossing the back of the neck, but the fretboard?? What are you looking to gain?

:thwap Oops, I read it to be just the back of the neck, not the fretboard! I'd leave the fretboard alone.
I'd still mask off anything that doesn't need the satin finish. It looks more professional for one thing.

[Duffy]

Sanding down the back of the neck can yield some interesting results, but you should seal it with boiled linseed oil or tung or teak oil if you sand it down all the way to the wood. You should be careful if you do this sanding and not have it sit around half sanded or sanded down for any length of time before sealing it with linseed oil or your choice of sealer because the wood of the neck will absorb moisture from the air, atmospheric moisture - humidity. This moisture can become trapped inside the neck once you seal it with linseed oil or whatever and cause problems later, such as in warping or twisting. If you sand down the back of the neck it might be advisable to seal the raw wood immediately to prevent moisture from migrating into the wood.

If you sand down the back of the neck it can result in a finish and feel that a lot of people like, as opposed to a heavily polyurethaned neck. It can improve the guitars playability. Final sanding with fine sandpaper will produce a very smooth surface to the touch. Oiling this smooth surface with boiled linseed oil, available at Lowes or other home improvement stores, or tung or teak oil, will seal the wood from moisture and provide a satin finish that can be buffed by hand to a beautiful lustre that many find appealing. You might want to make sure you wipe off all of the excess linseed or other oil, because if you don't it will form a tacky semi dry deposit that collects dust and impedes the smooth, silky like movement across the surface. You will want it to be completely buffed off, but sealed from moisture, so that your hand moves across it easily, without picking up any oil. You can apply more than one coat of oil, but be sure to buff it off completely so that it is dry. You can even sand it between oiling with very fine sandpaper, very lightly, and this will provide a progressively more satin-like feel. Just be sure to buff the oil off until it is dry and don't leave any raw, unsealed wood exposed.

Others will have methods that they prefer to use instead of the one mentioned above, but the method described above should provide excellent results when done to an average, inexpensive guitar neck or even body.

I would leave the polyurethane, or whatever "varnish" it is, on the fretboard to increase its durability, unless it is half worn off already; in which case I would remove it all and refinish it.

Some people would advise you to "just leave it alone", "don't fix it unless it's broken", and this type of comment; but you bought it, it's yours, you can do anything to it you want. Neil Young, or someone, painted his old goldtop Gibson Les Paul black, with a paint brush, supposedly. At least that's what shape it appears to be in now. John Lennon and George Harrison, while in the Beatles, stripped the finish off of their Epiphone Casinos - they were professionally sanded down from the original sunburst finish to the solid natural look and sprayed with a thin coat of "nitro-cellulose". The John Lennon Inspired Casino is supposed to "look like" the one he had professionally sanded and sprayed with a thin coat of nitro-cellulose, way back then. Harrison and Lennon had their reasons for stripping their Casinos, supposedly so that they would yield a different tone. There is no telling why people do a lot of things, especially seemingly unexplainable things.

[FLHX]

Thanks for the input. I'll leave it alone.