Cleaning a Guitar Fretboard

I always think that cleaning a guitar fretboard is a little bit like looking after a child!You love it – you spend quality time with it –
you want to take care of it because you care.

What I’m talking about here, specifically, is cleaning the fretboard – that is, the wooden face of the neck where the frets are, the bit under the strings that has the metal frets going across it.

Here are just some of the reasons why you should keep your fretboard clean

• To keep the wood in good condition – it’s a natural substance, so may need a little TLC to prevent cracks and dry-ness;
• To minimise corrosion – all that gunk on the wood will start to harm it and sweaty frets are not the best idea either;
• To make it look it’s best – clean polished wood looks better right?;
• To improve string contact with the frets (as they will be cleaned as well) – the cleaner they are, the more “solid” the contact from the string will be; improving sound and sustain;
• To spend quality time with your baby!

A great time to clean your fretboard is when you are changing the strings – I always do this every time, and this means I just need to give it a quick clean up and polish as it never gets a chance to get really dirty.

If you clean the fretboard each time you change the strings, it will require less cleaning, will be quicker to do and will keep the wood and finish in superb condition.

Very Important – Identify the kind of Fretboard wood

What we’re looking for here, is to know whether it is a Maple/finished fretboard, or one that is unfinished (which will generally be some form of Rosewood, Ebony or other exotic wood species.

Maple is the light coloured wood and is frequently finished with a glossy coating of some type.

Rosewood is much darker and Ebony is, obviously, very dark to black in colour.

I will show you some examples here, but if you are in any doubt, skip the extra activities in the section that is specific to Rosewood, Ebony and other exotic woods.

Even better, check your documentation or on the web to be quite sure you know what type of wood and whether the fretboard is finished (often, the neck is finished, but not the fretboard. This is extremely rare for Maple though, the fretboard will usually be finished unless it’s roasted maple).

Examples of Maple fretboards

Here is my Fender Stratocaster that has a Maple fretboard that is finished (see the light colour and glossy appearance?

And here is my Fender Telecaster that also has a finished Maple fretboard

This one is a bit different, it is a roasted maple (which makes it look slightly more like caramel) that is finished with gunstock oil (still Maple, so stick to the Maple approach for cleaning)

Examples of Ebony and Rosewood fretboards

This little beauty has an Ebony fretboard

And this one a Rosewood example

Finally, this is another Rosewood fretboard (it’s actually called Kingwood, but that is just a very specific species of Rosewood)

All Wood Types – If Your Fretboard has Massive Amounts of Gunk

Sometimes, a fretboard can be so mucky that you can physically scrape stuff off with your finger-nail! – gross…

This might be true if you’ve never cleaned your fretboard or because you might have purchased a used guitar that has never been cleaned.

The reason doesn’t matter – getting it cleaned up is the point!

What you’re looking to do here, is to scrape the worst off without damaging the fretboard or frets.

Use something like an old credit card or a flexible guitar pick – the idea is, something that is slightly bendy, hard enough to scrape but not hard enough to scratch.
This also means, don’t put loads of pressure on or use a corner.

Scrape in the direction of the neck length (with the grain of the wood), and just try to remove the worst with this method – this is not the final clean up and polish.

Maple Only – Clean up & Polish

Once you’ve got any major gunk off, you now need to get the fretboard and frets really, really clean.

Honestly, the best way of doing this is to use Naptha or Mineral Spirits and some kitchen towel or lint-free cloths.

Do not use ethanol/alcohol as this is too harsh.

Oh – do not smoke whilst you are doing this and it’s probably best to do this outdoors.

Just put some Naptha or mineral spirit on your cloth and rub away the dirt, frequently changing cloths of parts of the cloth – these should then be thrown away after use as you won’t be using them again.

Be sure to get right into the fret edges with this (both sides), you can use your finger nail behind the cloth to get into that corner or dig out your old credit card or guitar pick again.

Finally, use your guitar polish of choice to give the whole fretboard and the frets a really good shine – just apply the polish and use a clean kitchen towel or cloth to buff it up.

Be sure to buff both in the direction of the neck for the fretboard as well as along the frets as well to make them gleam!

Note – for roasted maple necks, use the same method, and once in a while, apply a new coat of gunstock oil if you are confident that it was used originally to seal the neck (some of Musicman signature guitars have this). You may also want to use the finest wire wool (0000) to gently polish the fretboard prior to applying new coats of gunstock oil.
If you do use 0000 finest wire wool, I strongly advise covering the guitar pickups with some painters tape to avoid micro-particles of the wire wool being captured by the magnetic poles of the pick ups.

Rosewood & Ebony Only – Clean up & Polish

The main difference here, is that these types of fretboard are unfinished (so there is no protection on the wood) and have an exposed grain.

Ebony, especially, does need particular care as it has a tendency to dry out over time.

You can use a combination of Naptha or Mineral oil on kitchen towel or lint free cloths, finest wire wool (0000) to really remove all the dirt.
If you do use 0000 finest wire wool, I strongly advise covering the guitar pickups with some painters tape to avoid micro-particles of the wire wool being captured by the magnetic poles of the pick ups.

Again, be sure to rub in the direction of the wood grain and get right into those fret edges as much as possible – pretty much like what you do with Maple fretboards, the only difference here is that you might need to use the fineest wire wool to clean out the grain of the wood a little.

Here is the stage that only applies to Rosewood and Ebony or other unfinished exotic woods

fretboards – you need to nurrish the oh so precious wood.

For most Rosewoods, this is something you need to do every 6 months to a year depending on the age of your guitar and the climate; for Ebony, you may need to do this more often – I’d say, go for every 4 to 6 months for Ebony.

Basically, you are wanting to avoid the fretboard wood from drying out too much and cracking, so really hot and dry climates is where you need to be very careful, more so with Ebony as it can be prone to shrinking if it gets too dry.

For this, use Lemon oil or equivalent, get out the kitchen towel again, and rub a little in the direction of the wood grain all over the fretboard and leave for an hour or so to soak in.

Once soaked in, get a cloth and polish up the fretboard as well as the frets (don’t use any additional polish here, you don’t need it).

I use, and highly recommend, a product called
Gorgomyte – which basically does everything in one hit for Rosewood or Ebony fretboards.

Basically, you cut off a piece about 2 by 2 inches (5cm) and use it to clean and nurrish your fretboard in one go! – So, know need for Naptha/Mineral-spirit, cloths, wirewool or anything, just a small square of the miracle
Gorgomyte.

It has a gentle abrasive that really cleans up the wood grain and then leaves a nurrishing oil on the fretboard that you wipe off later and polish.

It comes with instructions of course, but just follow the grain with it rubbing firmly, leave for an hour and polish up with a cloth – simple as that – it really is a brilliant product.

I use this on all my Rosewood and Ebony fretboards and it really does a job on them.
Lots of Guitar Picks[/caption]

In Conclusion

• Clean the fretboard regularly – I suggest every time you change your strings;
• There is an extra step for unfinished fretboards (Rosewood, Ebony etc) – nurrish the wood; don’t forget to try Gorgomyte;
• Roasted maple may need gunstock oil as appropriate.

I hope you’ve find my article on cleaning a guitar fretboard useful and informative – any questions? Have your own tips? Please leave a comment…

All the best and keep on rockin’

Al