This is probably an unusual restoration story because it doesn’t involve any refinishing, just painstaking hours of fiddly stripping, cleaning and polishing. And why? Well, sixties 330s are still quite rare in the UK and once I had seen that there was an opportunity to restore the guitar back to it’s original finish – albeit with standard player wear – I thought that it was right to have a go and do so. I absolutely love the top end refinishing which is demonstrated on the forum and if the guitar was not able to be restored to plain Mapleglo, I would have refinished in Burgundy (if the wood was nice) or White (if the wood was plain).
So, here are the before shots of the poor thing covered in thick brown brushed on varnish, but crucially showing some Mapleglo finish through the player wear. Initially I had thought that the guitar was sanded and prepped before the brown stain was applied, fortunately it was a very lazy job which had mercifully little affect on the finish below it (it was only keyed in). Ironically it did have clearcoat over the brown stain – well after you had spent so long brushing it on you wouldn’t want to see it damaged would you!
Part One - Before
The neck showed the glimmer of hope – I spied Mapleglo!
