ShortScale.org

sunshiner wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 6:28 am Vintage guitars get their highly desirable time worn colours mostly through the clear coat yellowing and making a cherry red SG go brown, a super white guitar go yellow, pelham blue guitars go greenish etc. If you sand the clear coat down you might discover the original colour completely intact.

That makes me wondering how the vintage Cardinal Red(Gibson) and Fiesta Red(Fender) get to be so effing red 60 years later. They are the reddest things I've seen and vintage firebirds look like they were painted yesterday, minus patina

NickD wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 8:45 am

sunshiner wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 6:28 am Vintage guitars get their highly desirable time worn colours mostly through the clear coat yellowing and making a cherry red SG go brown, a super white guitar go yellow, pelham blue guitars go greenish etc. If you sand the clear coat down you might discover the original colour completely intact.

That makes me wondering how the vintage Cardinal Red(Gibson) and Fiesta Red(Fender) get to be so effing red 60 years later. They are the reddest things I've seen and vintage firebirds look like they were painted yesterday, minus patina

Fenders tend to fade/change as a result of the clearcoat, Gibsons because of the aniline dye used on the mahogany. It fades to brown within a few years.

I don't know for certain, but I'd say the red guitars that haven't faded didn't have a clearcoat.

sunshiner wrote: ↑Sat Jan 01, 2022 12:35 pm

NickD wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 8:45 am

sunshiner wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 6:28 am Vintage guitars get their highly desirable time worn colours mostly through the clear coat yellowing and making a cherry red SG go brown, a super white guitar go yellow, pelham blue guitars go greenish etc. If you sand the clear coat down you might discover the original colour completely intact.

That makes me wondering how the vintage Cardinal Red(Gibson) and Fiesta Red(Fender) get to be so effing red 60 years later. They are the reddest things I've seen and vintage firebirds look like they were painted yesterday, minus patina

Fenders tend to fade/change as a result of the clearcoat, Gibsons because of the aniline dye used on the mahogany. It fades to brown within a few years.

I don't know for certain, but I'd say the red guitars that haven't faded didn't have a clearcoat.

I didn't know that about aniline. My Wilshire from ten years old came in a cherry finish over which they sprayed yellowish trasnparent laquer wich made the guitar look orange when new. With the time the clearcoat went even more yellow and guitar turned brownish

plopswagon wrote: ↑Fri Dec 31, 2021 1:59 pm My Dakota red Musicmaster II still looks quite red. I think that the yellowing top coat warms up the red a bit. The Fiesta red does tend to go more orange as it yellows. I can’t speak for the Gibsons but if they have time to fade, it means you probably should have busted off the headstock by now anyways.

plopswagon wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 2:29 am Although mid-60’s Fender shortscales referred to the offered as “red, white, and blue” the actual colors used were Dakota Red, Olympic White and Daphne Blue.