Finish Quality On Your Firebird V Sunbursts???

[bluezguy]

For all you guys who like playin' as much with yer 'bird as I do, here's a question about your paint finish on the sunburst FBV models.

Mine is a 2004 which I purchased brand new back then.

 

The colors are terrific as are the blend jobs. BUT, when hangin' on the wall and light hits 'er at certain angles, you plainly see the parallel pores of the wood grains ... as though not enough filler was used at prep time or not enough clear coat was applied ????

 

Does anyone's FBV suffer from the same finish (or lack of). Again, I have to compare everything on this instrument to my departed '76 Bi-Centenial on which the brown mahogany finish was rich and deep - not thin and 'porous'.

[anaconda]

It seems all painted gibsons with out a maple top all look like that . unless it's the mahogany stained ones like a sg standard .

being that it is harder to see the grain in the wood with matching stain . if the finish was poly instead of nitro, lacure it would

fill all the grain and you would not see the wood grain showing .

 

does gibson use to little finish on there guitars ? i think so , but others would say they want a thinner coat for resionance.

i really dont think a thicker coat of nito finish is going to hurt a soliod body guitar.

 

and yes they dont use enough filler in my opinion but gibsons are still great guitars i wouldnt be without one.

[bluezguy]

It seems all painted gibsons with out a maple top all look like that

 

Good point ... I was too lazy to think about the 'maple' top thing... just as lazy as Gibson was for not shooting enough nitro-whatever on my FBV. Since your answer, I hung my cherry SG Standard beside the 'bird on the same wall, same lighting. The SG has what I would say is the same high-quality finish as my LP Standard - a perfect job to my old eyeballs yet, the SG as we know, has no maple top.

 

Now ... don't get me wrong, I've been playing Gibsons over any other instrument my whole life except from age 0 - 10. and yes, they have screwed me over a few times BUT - they still are the best sounding and best performing tools of the trade out there