Re-finishing an Artist TC59

[McCreed]

Excellent!
It's good to have friends! (with power tools )

[dozymuppet]

Progress



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[McCreed]

That's looking tidy. You using a file/rasp there?

Are you going to do a forearm contour as well?

[dozymuppet]

Yep, just a half-rounded bastard file. I was looking at all sorts of tools and contraptions, but the tool I already had seems to be fit-for-purpose (though it may take a bit of time).

Not sure yet about a forearm contour. 50/50 at the moment, due to aesthetic considerations.

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[bronzesnake]

The finish on that guitar is pretty thick, but you'll add weight back on with any new finish, so you might want to think about reducing the weight by reducing the thickness by maybe 3mm. I'd simply sand down the back and front - with more off the back than the front.

Hey Simon.
I always liked a heavy guitar, they come in handy during live performances when fat chicks bum-rush the stage! OH! BOOM!

Seriously though, I'm a minority who really prefers a heavy guitar. I find the light hollowed out bodies make it feel like a toy. I obviously know there are some very expensive light models, so in my case it's personal preference and has nothing to do with back problems after years of playing heavy guitars, sound/tone/sustain or anything else.

When I started playing electric I'd been playing acoustic for about five years. So I was about 16 or 17 when I got my first electric guitar (which is a story in itself) there was no weight reduction options and I learned to play with a heavy Gibson Les Paul.

My folks are from England, my father served aboard the carrier HMS Illustrious during WWII and my mother assembled bomb components, another very dangerous occupation during the war as the Luftwaffe would have spies on the ground looking for these assembly plants so they could bomb them.

They came to Canada after the war and adopted me at four days old in 1962. I'm Cherokee, Irish and Scottish.
My mum's father, grandpa Greenwood loved car boot sales, which we call flea markets, and my mother got the bug from him.

Mom would drag my lazy ass out of bed at 5 am and would drive 45 minutes North of Toronto where she had a sales table in a large very well known flea market in Stoufville Ontario. She gave me $25 each weekend which I could spend where ever I wanted to.

One early Saturday morning I took my usual walk around the entire complex which was HUGE to see if I saw anything I wanted as all the venders were unloading their cars/trucks and setting their items out on tables.
This one morning I saw a white electric guitar sitting on a pile of WWI and WWII items which stuck out like a sore thumb because that vender only sold WWI and WWII items.

As a matter of fact I bought an awesome WWI sword, a WWII British helmet, and a pineapple grenade among many other items he sold me for dirt cheap. The sword alone was appraised at $800 to $1,500 CDN! Back then, which was around 1972/73 WWI and WWII items were dirt cheap.

So this white electric guitar was an anomaly at his booth and I asked what he wanted for it. He took $25!
I had been playing my first acoustic (a cheese grater) for close to a year and my father saw I was going to stick with it so he bought me an awesome Yamaha FG 365!!

I took the guitar home and pretty much forgot about for a few years!
Only after I had moved into my own apartment and had my first job did I realize what I had bought for $25!
It was a white Gibson Les Paul and I bought it used obviously and common sense told me whoever owned that guitar didn't pay good money for a Gibson LP only to get rid of it right away.

Whoever owned it knew it was a valuable real Gibson and in all likelihood played it for a few years at least before selling it. So it was used when I bought it around 72/73 and it's entirely reasonable to assume it was at least 5 to 10 plus years old when I bought it.

So at ten years old I bought my first electric which turned out to be a Gibson LP for $25!!!
The irony is - after I moved out I had completely forgot about it. Then for whatever reason I was reminded of it, I think I was looking at some album cover and saw a white Gibson LP.

That's when I realised the significance of that guitar. I visited my parents one Saturday and went to my old room but it wasn't there. I asked my mom if she knew where it was and her face went six shades of "oh sheeeeit" So Mom needed some stock as her sale items began to dwindle.

It was winter and all the yard/garage sales were shut down, and so she grabbed the guitar thinking it was a cheap low quality guitar which I hadn't bothered with after the first few days of bringing it home, and she sold it!! LOL!

I couldn't bring myself to ask what she sold it for, however, knowing my mother, whoever bought it was no doubt doing backflips not quite able to believe he/she absolutely swindled this little older English lady who had no clue what it was!

Yes, it stung, but I didn't blame my Mom at all, as I would have done the same thing if I were in her shoes at the time!
I got it for a scandalously low price, then the god of odds levelled the great Karmic wheel and somebody else got it for a steal! ")

Apologies for the lengthy comment, I thought you or others reading this would get a kick from it!
Take care brother Simon.

Jack ~'()'~
Canada

[McCreed]

Yep, just a half-rounded bastard file. I was looking at all sorts of tools and contraptions, but the tool I already had seems to be fit-for-purpose (though it may take a bit of time).

Not sure yet about a forearm contour. 50/50 at the moment, due to aesthetic considerations.

Hah! It just so happens that I'm becoming a half-round bastard!

My arms are getting sore just thinking about using a file, but we do what we gotta do. I go pretty extreme by using an angle grinder with a flap-disk. It makes pretty short work of the bulk of it, then hit with a detail sander.

re: forearm cut, after doing to my two tele builds, I'll never go back to a traditional flat front again. Just my personal preference.

[fender3x]

Hah! It just so happens that I'm becoming

re: forearm cut, after doing to my two tele builds, I'll never go back to a traditional flat front again. Just my personal preference.

1+ I have a G&L ASAT bass. It has a belly cut, but no forearm cut, and I really want one. I am just waiting for the finish to get bad enough on it to add one and refinish...

[dozymuppet]

Well, I'm convinced, and have now started work on the forearm contour.

I "had" to buy a new McCreed file, something crankier, to get through it quicker. Things moved faster.



Now leveling it down and smoothing it out.



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[Simon Barden]

It's going to be so light, you'll need to tie weights to it to stop it floating away!

[dozymuppet]

I suspect it will still be on the heavy side (down to 2.29kg now), but I'm having fun anyway





Trusty toolset developing nicely.



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