Dyeing a rosewood fretboard

[Riffster]

Did a little bit of research and found that the consensus for dyeing a fretboard is to go with alcohol based Fiebings Leather Dye.

 

I have a 12-string Fender acoustic that cost me $140, very, very well made and for the price a no brainer.

 

The fingerboard though looked bleached, really pale and dry looking rosewood. No matter how much oil I used it would get dark and then reverse back to pale again.

 

I applied, one coat of Fiebings Dark Brown dye and looked pretty good but decided to apply 2 more coats to get a full effect.

 

2 things to note is that with the additional coats the fingerboard did not continue to get darker and that this stuff will stain the inlays, in my case I did not mind since the inlays are dots and this is a cheap guitar.

 

The color was a bit more amber than I wanted it to be but once I applied lemon oil all the amber seemes to have dissapeared, now the fretbaord looks like rosewood and matches the bridge perfectly.

 

Here are the pics.

 

 

 

 

 

[BigKahune]

Nice job!

 

I like the new look.

[MrNylon]

Looks really good.

[cornflake]

Did a little bit of research and found that the consensus for dyeing a fretboard is to go with alcohol based Fiebings Leather Dye.

 

I have a 12-string Fender acoustic that cost me $140, very, very well made and for the price a no brainer.

 

The fingerboard though looked bleached, really pale and dry looking rosewood. No matter how much oil I used it would get dark and then reverse back to pale again.

 

I applied, one coat of Fiebings Dark Brown dye and looked pretty good but decided to apply 2 more coats to get a full effect.

 

2 things to note is that with the additional coats the fingerboard did not continue to get darker and that this stuff will stain the inlays, in my case I did not mind since the inlays are dots and this is a cheap guitar.

 

The color was a bit more amber than I wanted it to be but once I applied lemon oil all the amber seemes to have dissapeared, now the fretbaord looks like rosewood and matches the bridge perfectly.

 

Here are the pics.

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah looks good I may try that with the Kona A\E I keep for my buddys to fram on.

[Bender 4 Life]

dramatic improvement S/H !!!

 

The f/b on my '56 GT (Epi) was heavily striped when I got it, and good ole' Kiwi shoe polish (naptha based) made a big improvement, but not as much as your leather dye.......i'll have to try that, thanks for sharing!

[daveinspain]

Nice job, looks great!

[Andre S]

Very nice, I just hope that the stain does not come off on your fingers when you are playing.

[Riffster]

It does not come off...leather dye is designed not to come off.

 

Bender just remember that the dye will color inlays so you have to tape them off or figure out a way to clean them immediately.

[Tim Plains]

No matter how much oil I used it would get dark and then reverse back to pale again.

Just lemon oil or did you try anything else? I find when I leave Fret Doctor on for a good 90 minutes the board comes out practically black.

[Riffster]

Just lemon oil or did you try anything else? I find when I leave Fret Doctor on for a good 90 minutes the board comes out practically black.

 

I only tried lemon oil, this particular fretboard was so bleach looking I figured the only way to color it would be actual dye.

 

With lemon oil the board would look great but as soon as it dried/absorbed it would be back to its original color, I put about 10 passes of lemon oil with the same results.

 

I have heard of several approaches to accomplish this, n a more expensive guitar probably I would have tried somthing that did not tint the inlays.

[rocketman]

The looks incredible! I've tried a whole bunch of different products and, as R9 states, Fret Doctor is the best stuff out there. I'm curious to see what Ed Boyle (owner of Fret Doctor) thinks about this. He'll give you an honest opinion. I'll email Ed to see what he thinks...

[rocketman]

Here is Ed's response...

 

The purpose of FretDoctor is twofold:

 

1. It will usually restore the color of a tropical hardwood to the way it appeared when it was new.

2. It will penetrate the wood and stabilize its geometry.

 

Those are the short answers. Here are the longer version.

 

Quality tropical hardwood, under the best of circumstances, should require no stain when the instrument is made...just oil. However, low priced instruments were probably stained at one point or the other, in order to make them more attractive for sale. Quality Rosewood or Cocobolo is a beautiful wood with complex grain and gorgeous color. If it becomes faded, Fret Doctor will usually bring it back to the original color and grain. Quality Ebony has a brownish tinge to it when newly cut or turned. Over the course of a few months, it will gradually darken to the normal black color. Imperfect Ebony may be stained somewhere along the way. Same with Grenadilla or African Blackwood.

 

Now, to deal with the Fiebings stain. I think the guitar in the photo looks great! I am glad they used a brown stain rather than black. Just bear in mind that it looks better but no stain will preserve the wood. It still has to be oiled.

 

Many people want to "darken" their board when they really mean "blacken." They want it to look like an "old" guitar. One point they should realize is that many really old guitars didn't originally have black boards. A generation or two ago, they were treated with Linseed oil, which oxidizes over time and turns black. That's why old furniture in museums commonly looks black in color.

 

Anyway, always bear in mind that wood stains can be very unpredictable. I know that from personal experience. Sometimes the final product is a lot darker than the owner wants and you really can't back up. Use small amounts until you have some idea of how the job is going to turn out. Also remember that making a board look pretty doesn't mean that it is preserved in any way.

 

When a high quality instrument, guitar or woodwind is constructed, the wood must be air-dried to allow it to relax any hidden faults, warps, cracks. If the wood is quickly kiln dried, faults may show up later. If the wood continues to dry, the dubiously described "fret sprout" may occur. The frets didn't grow, the wood shrunk in the short dimension when it continued to dry. A bit of a low molecular weight, highly penetrating vegetable-based oil will stabilize the dimensions of the wood.

 

Let me take the time to describe a phenomenon that is very much in common with woodwinds. Woodwinds have sound holes in them, sometimes covered with a finger and sometimes with a key and pad. Fretboards have fret beds carved in them, into which the fret wire is installed.

 

If a woodwind dries too much, the finger holes grow larger, the circumference gets smaller, and the instruments actually gets shorter, although not by much. In theory, it will play a bit on the sharp side.

 

When a fret board dries, the fret beds, just like the finger holes, grow larger, which stresses any adhesive that is holding the fret wire. The board narrows, causing "fret sprout," and it is actually a bit shorter, just like a woodwind. Mind you, the latter is incredibly small.

 

A low molecular weight, vegetable based oil product, like FretDoctor, will penetrate the wood and stabilize it.

 

Just about all of the products out there for use on fret boards is actually the same stuff...mineral oil. Sometimes it is called paraffin oil - same stuff. Sometimes a bit of Lemon scent is added. They all coat the surface but don't preserve the wood to any degree, although they may make it look pretty for a while. Rosewood oil is a scent. It has nothing to do with the Rosewood used in musical instruments. Rosewood oil comes from a bush. Rosewood comes from a tree.

 

Final note: Oiling a tropical hardwood is simply filling the microscopic spaces in the wood that originally contained water with oil. Once they are full, it won't take any more. In most cases this takes a few drops of oil per fret - maximum. This Internet hearsay of "saturating" the wood with oil sounds like sauteing a veal cutlet. Same with oil causing loose frets. Oiling a board actually tightens them by returning the fret beds to their proper dimensions.

[Riffster]

Great answer. I did know a lot of the things he says.

 

For this guitar I wanted the board to simply look like Rosewood, not black like you would see in a vintage guitar. I simply wanted the board to match the bridge.

 

This particular guitar would simply not retain the nice color that lemon oil would immediately bring on the board, I applied about 10 coats of oil and shortly after the board would start getting light again to the point of the first pic I posted. Too much oil has to be bad.

 

In contrast my 2 LPs, Explorer, Casino and Guild all look great for 6 months with a single pass of lemon oil. I prefer the brown shade of Rosewood rather than the darker boards.

 

As I mentioned I also applied oil after the dyeing since the board still needs to be conditioned, especially after using an alcohol based product to do the dyeing.

 

I bought the dye at a Tandy Leather store, the guy there told me he uses the exact same product and color to dye gun stocks.

[damian]

A most exellent thread......thankyou...

[Riffster]

It has been a couple of weeeks and the fretboard still looks great, in the past even after many passes with lemon oil the fretboard would go back to look chalky within several days. So far so good