How Do I Repair Chipped Polyurethane

Equally with everything, information technology all depends on the specifics, so it will be helpful to see a photograph of the section of the guitar than needs a "touch-up" or "repair" . . .

On the reasonably simple side, if it is just a missing piece of clear polyurethane, then the general technique is to find a polyurethane varnish that matches the existing finish, at which point you will begin filling the missing department with layers of polyurethane over several days or weeks, allowing enough of drying time. Once the repair department has more than than sufficient layers of varnish and has dried completely, yous will switch to sanding and polishing the surface area to blend information technology with the existing finish, noting that this is done with a combination of very fine professional person sandpaper and, in the polishing phase, of polishing rouge or something similar to "jeweler'south rouge", if y'all adopt, which basically is a very fine abrasive paste . . .

Nonetheless, on the more complicated side, if the existing guitar stop includes elaborate colorization (for case, either a custom color or wood stain, such as the classic Fender 3-colour sunburst cease), so the repair work moves to an entirely different level of complexity, depending on many factors, which includes the type of stop, color(s), and so along and so on. And it might not be polyurethane varnish, perhaps beingness lacquer or some other blazon of finish . . .

Another important factor to consider is the value of the guitar, both in terms of overall cost and of how important it is to your playing . . .

Regarding toll and time, information technology depends on whether you have a workshop with all the necessary tools and supplies, which can range from simple to elaborate . . .

For example, you tin can see that I did a bit of woodworking and finishing on The Fabulous Fifty Million Dollar Trinaural Stratocaster�, and while all the work (including the new pickups, controls, wiring, and so forth) actually took about a calendar week or so, it took over 3 months of diligent research, development, shopping, and waiting to get all the tools and parts, even though I already had a full general type of workshop which certainly was more than sufficient to do any blazon of home or automobile repair . . .

Fabled Stratocaster Modification Project (GuitarZone.com FORUM)

The tools price more than the Fender American Deluxe Stratocaster, with the new hardware, Seymour Duncan pickups, Rothstein TONE controls, knobs, wires, and everything else costing more than the tools, such that when you consider the time and effort required to exercise everything I call back it is reasonable to propose that the overall price so far is well beyond what a Fender Custom Store "David Gilmour" Stratocaster costs, which is fabulous . . .

Of grade, the Fender Custom Shop "David Gilmour" Stratocaster does

not

take ii separate and independent output signals (a strange variation of what one might call "stereo"), and information technology does

not

have all the highly customized Rothstein TONE controls, and then along and so on, including a Actually Big Knob� . . .

And then, as an case of a more than expensive repair, if the guitar was a Gibson Les Paul "Golden Top" and the chipped area was on the top of the guitar body, then starting from scratch in terms of tools and then along, you lot might hands spend several hundreds of dollars (US) getting various paints, sparkles, glitter, varnishes, sandpapers, and so forth and so on . . .

And some other reality is that it takes a while for the various layers of finishing materials to dry, and then at minimum the guitar will exist in the workshop for a week or 2, with the time increasing depending on how elaborate the finishing work needs to be . . .

Yet, one time y'all have the necessary tools and finishing supplies, the actual work is very simple, merely it takes a while, because the finishing material(s) needs to dry out thoroughly earlier you can offset doing the sanding and polishing . . .

Y'all can use an incandescent light seedling as a mild oestrus source to decrease the drying fourth dimension, only it takes a few days for varnish to dry thoroughly no matter what you do, and if you are in an area with high humidity, it could take weeks for the first coat of varnish to dry out thoroughly, so you need to exercise the work in an environment with depression to moderate humidity, which ideally should exist grit-free and temperature-controlled, as well . . .

From a practical perspective, the most of import thing is that you lot seal the exposed wood where the end chipped, considering over fourth dimension the unsealed wood will begin to absorb humidity from the air, which eventually will cause all sorts of issues (at least for a solid-torso guitar) . . .

If you study a Fender Stratocaster or Gibson Les Paul guitar, what y'all find is that all the guitar body is finished--typically with multiple layers of varnish, lacquer, or something--including the wood underneath the pick guard and so forth, and this is done to prevent the guitar trunk from absorbing moisture from the air, likewise every bit from drying out, if you happen to exist in a desert . . .

However, the rules are dissimilar for nearly acoustic, hollow-trunk electrical, and semi hollow-body electric guitars, where information technology is more than typical that the inside surfaces of the forest are non sealed or finished, and so it all depends, actually . . .

Really!

This is a link to the Stewart-MacDonald website, where you tin can get books, videos, tools, and finishing supplies for doing just about any type of repair:

Guitar Finishing and Repairing (Stewart-MacDonald)

So, if the appearance of the chipped expanse is non a huge problem for you lot, and then the elementary solution is to get some wood sealer, varnish, or whatever works best with the existing finish then to seal the exposed wood, which basically protects the guitar body from boosted harm . . .

Notwithstanding, the specific way to do the protective matter will depend on the type of finish and so forth and and so on, because if the guitar has an elaborate terminate, you will desire to be careful to seal the wood just enough to protect it but non so much that doing a full repair later is not made more difficult--noting that the business organization hither is that, for example, if the forest is stained, so sealing an unstained only exposed department tends to arrive more difficult to stain the forest correctly later on . . .

The reality is that nothing is unproblematic at the dawn of the early on 21st century, really . . .

Really!