Les Paul Studio Mod: Faux Binding (Pics)

[Deej]

So I love my Les Paul Studio Faded Maple Top, don't get me wrong. These guitars are straight up beautiful! Especially if you spend a little time polishing them. However, one thing I always loved about higher end Les Pauls was the binding. It just makes the guitar look BETTER. So I decided to mod my Studio to have "binding". I think it really added character to this guitar, both in looks and in "mojo". Well, because I did it myself. I wanted to document this experience on the Gibson website in case some brave Do It Yourself-ers wanted to take the task at hand to have a more "higher end" look.

Now I have seen faux binding added to refinished VM's, but never with a Studio Faded Maple Top.... So maybe this will be the first!

 

Let me know what you think!

 

Here are some before pictures:

 

 

 

 

And after (sorry for the shots, iPhones don't take the greatest low-lighting pictures!)

 

 

 

 

[chase1410]

looks great man! nice job!

[craigh]

It does look nice. Les Pauls do look better with binding.

 

Craig

[Deej]

Thanks you all! It's good to hear those with actual "high-end" Les Pauls tell you your Studio looks good. I appreciate it! Someday I may tell myself that I need to step up to a more expensive guitar.. But this one suits me well, plus it's kind of cool to have a "bound" Les Paul body with an unbound neck.. Sort of unique I suppose..

[charlie brown]

Looks Great! Some of the earliest (real '50's)"Gold Tops" had body binding, but no neck binding.

In that vain, I've been thinking of making the "faux" binding, on my '50's Tribute Gold Top, more

pronounced (lighter)...IF, I end up keeping it, that is. ??? Your results, are encouraging, in

that way.

 

CB

[Dub-T-123]

From what I can see, you did a great job. It looks real. Very nice!

[strat-o-steve]

That does make a huge difference! Looks great. May I ask, is this actual binding, or paint?

[badbluesplayer]

Looks great!! How did you do it?

[Deej]

It is not actual binding or real paint, but just the exposed maple top. This is what I did...

Because the nitro is so thin on these faded tops, it was very easy to sand. So I put painter's tape as a guide around the side, where the maple cap stopped.

 

I then cut very thin squares of 100 grit sand paper and took away the side nitro and red paint.

 

I went over the guitar again to give the binding "depth". I angled the sand paper on the top of the guitar to take away a little bit of paint from the edges, to make it look like it had some thickness.

 

I moved to 320 grit sand paper to smooth the edges.

 

Now that just the maple cap was showing, I used clear coat to protect the exposed wood. One thin coat, sand, a thick coat and another sand.

 

One last 320 grit sand, wax, and you can't tell it was after market.

 

I'm very happy with the results! I'll try to get some better pictures up soon to show it in decent light.

[chase1410]

Very cool...I could never trust myself with a job like that, but you obviously have some skills...

[Deej]

Thanks bud!

[BigKahune]

There's been a couple other members that have done this to their studios.

 

I like the look.

 

And your project turned out very nicely. Nice job.

[Deej]

Thanks!

[Andre S]

I did the same, except I made mine more pronounced from the front. It looks great on yours. Here are some pics of mine.

 

 

Sorry for the poor angle. I had taken more, then deleted some and now these are the only ones left. If you would like to see more I'll take more.

 

EDIT: Could you point me to a similar product to what you used to clear coat it?

In the limited time that I have looked, I didn't see anything suitable?

 

Mine has been exposed for a year-ish

[Deej]

I'm not really sure what the best idea would be for the higher gloss, non faded, series. I used a wipe on Poly.. I know I know, the Paul has Nitro on it.. But I had no idea where to get ahold of that stuff. Still, the poly looks great and blended fantastic. You may want to look into some sort of Nitro, as you have some scratches around your binding. I do believe unwaxed Nitro would "blend" in to the new Nitro.. Correct me if I'm wrong tho.

[Andre S]

I'm not really sure what the best idea would be for the higher gloss, non faded, series. I used a wipe on Poly.. I know I know, the Paul has Nitro on it.. But I had no idea where to get ahold of that stuff. Still, the poly looks great and blended fantastic. You may want to look into some sort of Nitro, as you have some scratches around your binding. I do believe unwaxed Nitro would "blend" in to the new Nitro.. Correct me if I'm wrong tho.

 

Yea the scratches were from moving too fast with sandpaper and using the sanding bit on a Dremel type tool.

I think I prefer to leave it unfinished than to put poly. Nothing is wrong with poly, but it already has nitro, so I may just leave it unfinished.

[Deej]

What about carnauba wax? That won't fully protect it but it may be better than unfinished? With time that may lead to a unique coloration of the wood. Only time will tell! Gotta love it!

[T Bone]

While I've never bought or used this product, or finished a guitar, I saw this product referenced here on the Forum awhile back. I thought enough of it then to save the link in my reference section. Seems to be about what the Dr. ordered for the bare wood you've got.

[ctguy1955]

What a great job you did !!!!!!! You must be soooooooooooooo proud of the way it came out !!! My new studio was received in the mail on May 1st and was unplayable. The Gibson authorized luthier has had it for 10

days now and Im getting really impatient to get it back. He said he is very busy, but my guitar should be ready by tuesday or wednesday. I cant wait !!! I would never even attempt to try this to my studio, although

if the results were like yours, I would like it done. Too bad some company did not have a white 3D tape temporary thing that would not strip off the lacquer if you removed it. Im getting a used HSS strat in the mail

this morning, so at least I will have a new axe to play with in the meantime !! Congrats on your great job !!!!!!

[ctguy1955]

I did the same, except I made mine more pronounced from the front. It looks great on yours. Here are some pics of mine.

 

 

Sorry for the poor angle. I had taken more, then deleted some and now these are the only ones left. If you would like to see more I'll take more.

 

EDIT: Could you point me to a similar product to what you used to clear coat it?

In the limited time that I have looked, I didn't see anything suitable?

 

Mine has been exposed for a year-ish

 

 

I bought the 2012 one with the new coil taps push pull, but they delivered it with creme plastics instead of black.

Guitar Center was nice enough to send my Gibson authorized all of the black plastic parts while he is doing a setup on my new guitar

so when I pick it up in a few days, it will look like the one I ordered from the GC site. I have to keep the creme plastics and

switch the parts back, if I ever have to have work done on my Studio. The 2012 model ONLY comes in creme, which I did not care for.

 

I look forward to seeing how yours looks after you put some clear coat layers on and polish the edges up !! Great Job !!!

 

http://s968.photobucket.com/albums/ae168/CTguy1955/2012gibsonmay2009.jpg

[badbluesplayer]

I did the same, except I made mine more pronounced from the front. It looks great on yours. Here are some pics of mine.

 

 

Sorry for the poor angle. I had taken more, then deleted some and now these are the only ones left. If you would like to see more I'll take more.

 

EDIT: Could you point me to a similar product to what you used to clear coat it?

In the limited time that I have looked, I didn't see anything suitable?

 

Mine has been exposed for a year-ish

 

Ouch... That used to be a nice guitar.

 

Remember, the guys who make these guitars are expert woodworkers and unless you have a LOT of woodworking experience, you'll never be able to do work that's the same high caliber as the factory luthiers. Once you do something like that, there's no way to ever get that guitar back to looking decent.

[Cus2310]

Ouch... That used to be a nice guitar.

 

Remember, the guys who make these guitars are expert woodworkers and unless you have a LOT of woodworking experience, you'll never be able to do work that's the same high caliber as the factory luthiers. Once you do something like that, there's no way to ever get that guitar back to looking decent.

 

 

It's still a beautiful guitar, it just needs a little finishing touch to clean it up. Why do some folk try and take a dump on something that another person is clearly proud of? We are all sensitive to snide comments about our guitars so it's not very cool to do so.

[DestructorsKillMusic1982]

After reading about this I did the same to my Cherry Sunburst 60s Tribute w/P-90s, a very nice improvement!

[Mark]

After reading about this I did the same to my Cherry Sunburst 60s Tribute w/P-90s, a very nice improvement!

 

Any Pics?

[peteclancymusic]

Here's an epic bump - inspired by this thread, I recently did the same thing with my 2012 Studio 50's Tribute. Not only the faux binding, but the whole back and neck (didn't touch the front). It was great fun. Here's the back before I started:

With the paint stripped and wood sanded:

After a coat of the mahogany stain I bought at Bunnings:

 Ready for spraying 2 clear coats all over the guitar (you can see where the maple cap was left unpainted):

The finished back:

The finished front with the faux binding:

Was pretty happy with it for a first effort. 2 things I'd improve if I did it all again would be to round the corner of the faux binding off more to give it "depth" as noted by the original poster, and to spend more time really sanding all the residue of the original coat off - this would give a more pure effect to the new coat, especially around the sides. Here it is in action (with different pickups):

https://youtu.be/axWGIQxvqtsv