Official Luthiers Forum!

Hello all, hope everyone is safe.

À very nice AV 65 came in the shop recently and the big neck is so nice I bought it for myself.

Now, I find the rosewood board to be on the light side, so much so that at first I suspected Pau Ferro. After regular cleaning and a bit of mineral oil the wood regained a deeper color and it's definitely rosewood, albeit of a lighter shade than I like. I'm sure this happened to many of you.

What have you tried to successfully darken rosewood boards?

Any of you have tried Fret Doctor? I'm skeptical of such claims as they make.

I'm not suggesting to rekindle the oil/no oil/snake/armpit debate, just interested in the darkening bit, so I turn to you guys for your opinion/experience with it.




Pierre

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Pierre Castonguay

Well? Anybody? C'mon gals and guys...


Pierre

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Pierre Castonguay

I remember Dan Erlewine mentioning using an oil of some sort to restore the patina of an older rosewood fretboard after a re-fret. I can't remember exactly what he said though. I think it had something to do with walnuts or watco?

I just googled how to darken a rosewood fret board though and got something similar and this thread looks helpful...

https://www.lespaulforum.com/forum/show ... -Fretboard

Thanks Conor.

Same thread as I found. I guess I'd have to try FretDoctor, but I'm feeling like there's a lot of mineral oil and not much else in this bottle. And it's a pain to get it up here in Canada (they won't ship to Quebec, without offering any reason why nor replying to my emails).

So I guess I'm going to try bore oil first, it's readily available here. Not using "lemon" oil anymore, not in many years anyway.

I remember reading about someone here using Old English Scratch Cover for dark woods... does that ring a bell to anyone?


Pierre

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Pierre Castonguay

Howard Feed'N'Wax

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Yep we use Howards too. Been using it on my personal stuff for fifteen years, love it.

Thanks Chris and Hesh. I see I can get the stuff here in Québec so I'll be giving it a try real soon.

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Pierre Castonguay

Well my curiosity got piqued, so I had a look at their other products, too. Any of you ever used their Restor-a-finish stuff, on instruments or furniture? As an antiques lover, I like the fact that you have a choice for colors.

I'm tempted to try this stuff on scraps and see what I get...


Pierre

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Pierre Castonguay

I've used it many times for freshening up kitchen cabinet doors and old furniture. Worked great for those projects.
I agree about using F-N-W for fingerboards, new and old.

Just ordered both products, will do some testing with Restor-o-something on some rosewood fretboard material and report here.

With such stellar endorsements I take it for granted that FnW will be great.


Thanks guys!

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Pierre Castonguay

Quick report : Feed 'n Wax works great for fingerboards. Wood absorbs fast, and leaves no residue once you have wiped the excess off and buffed it a bit by hand. Nice finish, somewhat less oily than mineral oil, brings out variations in color of the rosewood in a very nice way, but does not darken wood very noticeably.

Restor-a-Finish seems rather less successful at it, probably because there is no finish to begin with on rosewood fingerboards. I'll have a try on finished dark wood soon enough.

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Pierre Castonguay