Navigators with Poly vs. Nitro?

sumitagarwal

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Sweet Navigator Wader2k!

Sumit, that is pretty common on most guitars I think.
Hrm, haven't gotten any fading on any of my Orville by Gibsons. And I've tried.

Trying to think of any other red guitars I have. I did used to have a red early 2000's Gibson Flying V. Don't think I got fading on that.
 

wader2k

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Sweet Navigator Wader2k!

Sumit, that is pretty common on most guitars I think.
Thank's Puck...it was gifted to me by JDZ over on TGP.. I've seen him post here too.

Plays Iike a dream.... can't put it down long enough to be looking at paint fading under the pups... 8^)
 

sumitagarwal

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Not a bad carve on this one. Note the correctly flattened pickup plateau

20230318_144846 (1).jpg
 

sumitagarwal

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Thought this shot from Abalone Vintage was interesting... you can see how the chipped nitro turns that same whiteish yellow, but seems to be specifically around areas with a lot of skin contact. My guess is finger oils are leaching out the dyes from the nitro.

It also makes me curious about the mahogany dye/pore-fill process. On original bursts the back is pore-filled with dyed filler, and then the nitro is only a clear coat but it sucks up the red dye, making the nitro turn red (this is also why the red bleeds into the nitro over the binding). By contrast the majority of singlecuts these days simply use a red paint on top of the undyed mahogany.

Interestingly the mahogany on the Navigator is clearly dyed along with the red pore filler. However, it seems like the clear coat is sitting on top of the dyed mahogany instead of sucking up the dye into the nitro. Because of this the chipped areas reveal red mahogany instead of brown mahogany.

1959_gibson_les_paul_standard_guitar_burst_vintage_back2.jpeg
 

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