How to flatten a warped pickguard

[Brendan]

Ordered a pickguard from China - wanted a black one rather than the red tortoise shell standard VP one.
It arrived a touch bent.
Tried weighing it down with a bag of sand and while it improved, still some significant deviation.
So.. here's the trick to fix one...

1. Take off all the protective plastic - you're going to cook it and I'm not sure how it'll go in the oven.
2. Heat up an oven to ~100 deg C. Mine's fan forced, but around that temp - don't want too much more.
3. Place as flat as possible on an oven tray - I ended up using 2 as the VP is a big pickguard.
4. Put in the oven.
5. Watch it - took me 3 minutes to get flexible enough to lay flat.
6. Take it out and weigh it down with something heavy(ish). I placed a sheet of greaseproof between the phone books and the pickguard.
7. Leave 10 minutes and viola (or more bass! - sorry, terrible joke).

[Brendan]

And the finished product...

And... too small - different size to the VP... That's what you get when you shop in China.
D'oh!

[adam]

Haha, sorry, but that was hilarious. Do you want me to add a black pickguard for the VP-4 to the next order?

[maxaxe]

Oy, Brendan . . .

How do you flatten a warped guitarist?

[adam]

I forgot to add that it does look very flat. So, the technique is solid.

[Brendan]

Ads,
Yes please - Gav has just run me through how much work is involved in cutting a new pickguard.

Max,

[adam]

Brendan, will do, but our next order isn't due until February, can you wait until then?