[Stuart049]

Hey guys,

As you can probably guess by the title, I've damaged the lacquer on my Gibson J-45 ...

Long story short, I left a white paint marker pen on top of my guitar the other day to go answer the phone and the damn thing leaked.
In a panic I put a small amount of white spirit on a cloth and started rubbing it off (I occasionally use white spirit to clean my other guitars, it works very well on them, so naturally I assumed it would work on my J-45), of course I quickly noticed that the white spirit was in fact melting the lacquer and drew the conclusion that its a different type of lacquer than on my other guitars.

I'm sure I'm not the only person to make this cock up, as I'm sure you can guess I now have a very cloudy, slightly rough area on my guitar ..

What is the best way to sort this? Is it something I can buff out with a bit of elbow grease and the right polish? or is a guitar technician job?

Thanks
Stuart

[jedzep]

Unfortunately, you need a repair, not so much in the mechanical but rather the cosmetic realm. Not all guys who can level frets or reset a neck can blend lacquer issues. If your guitar shop doesn't tell you it's a 'piece of cake' repair, or they want to use nitro to overspray, take it to an old school furniture refinisher. I'm pretty fortunate in that my 'tech' has a fine touch with cosmetics.

[CHH]

Your title and story together, I think lead to confusion. It says "Lacquer + Alcohol" in the title and then "white spirit" in the body of the text. I don't think "white spirit" is alcohol. My experience and memory agree with Wikipedia, which describes white spirit as a refined petroleum solvent, perhaps synonymous with Stoddard solvent. And their discussion allows that up to 25% at least in some cases can be aromatic hydrocarbons. Those are suspect if your white spirit is like theirs (and my experience)and some component is dissolving lacquer. Alcohol?

[Stuart049]

Sorry my mistake .. your right, I'm mixing up alcohol with solvent.

It was white spirit I used to clean the paint and it just made the surface cloudy and sticky.

[retrorod]

White spirits have been known to make me cloudy and hazy at times
Best of luck on getting it shiny again

[CHH]

If it's just cloudy and sticky, I'd hold out hope that drying time and then buffing might be all it needs. One kind of cloudiness happens when you have some component(s) dissolved and some component(s) not dissolved. If some finish has been removed so that there's a depression or hole, that can be repaired later after time tells you what you have. Good luck.