Reviving Jennifer

My acoustic is getting old. As of this year, she's been in my possession for the past 10 years. I practically grew up playing this guitar; I learnt many radio pop songs from the Backstreet Boys, Savage Garden, Richard Marx and N'Sync. I learnt my first worship songs from Hillsong, Sonicflood, and Avalon. I got hooked on the alternative sound forever from learning the Goo Goo Dolls, Ash and Gin Blossoms.

I can't remember why I named her Jennifer. It was probably because I thought the dreadnought shape of the acoustic and its larger lower bout reminded me of big bums (and Jennifer Lopez came to mind).

This guitar has probably seen three gigs in her entire life, aside from her usage at cell group and church camps. The call came and there was no readily available acoustic for the gig. Alas, I needed Jennifer to be in a presentable condition. When I picked her up from her stand, things weren't looking good; the frets had accumulated a green layer of gunk, the fretboard was dried out, and the white binding turned green. There was a fair bit of work I had to do, and I decided the easiest to start was to change the strings (which were black with dirt and brown with rust).

I'll make an honest admission here; I don't know a lot about acoustic guitar strings. I probably should start reading up or experimenting. My excuse is that I'm primarily an electric guitarist 99% of the time, and whenever I gig on an acoustic, it's borrowed. I went for a simple set of D'Addario Extra Lights (10's), bought from Believer Music (thanks Wendy!).

I don't know how the string material changes the tone of the acoustic. I use a Seymour Duncan woody pickup, so I figured that any set of strings will do. Besides, I changed my technique significantly over the past half-year. I can't strum heavily anymore, and I don't dig as deeply as I used to. Now when I play an acoustic unamplified, it's reached a state where I'm barely audible. I hope that means I won't be breaking strings anymore (fingers crossed; I haven't broken one in 4 months!).

Here's my "revival kit" spread out on the floor with the tools I used:

The green cloth is actually an army cloth I used to clean my rifle with! It's now a dedicated guitar cleaning cloth. I removed the strings and set out to remove the gunk out of the frets and remoisturize the fretboard. I used the mighty Dr Ducks Axe Wax to do the job:

I was initially skeptical about using Dr Ducks. It seemed too miraculous a product to be relied upon. Seriously? It can clean everything? I knew it had good uses for giving strings a wipe-down after a gig, but for everything else, it just seemed improbable. I'd never have considered using this for remoisturizing the fretboard, but alas, my supply of lemon oil got depleted with the last string change (on one of my rosewood fingerboard guitars).

I was desperate. I give up on all inhibitions and just went with it. The first application dissolved most of the gunk that was caked. The second restored some colour to the fretboard. By the third, the fretboard was looking pretty decent. You know what? Dr Ducks actually works! I'm a happy Dr Ducks convert now.

Here's a close up of the neck and the frets that were worn out:

These frets are so worn out that the strings sit in a "valley". They don't buzz anymore because the rest of the frets have all worn down to a level where they're all even!

About an hour's work later, here's Jennifer looking presentable:



She sounded good during my gig at Olive Vine, which I truly believe was mostly due to the fantastic job of Leon and Randall on the sound team! Kudos to an excellent job.

Splendid.
-JC

Posted in: Guitars,Howto