I've used Montypresso on a few guitars and played around with a couple of different ways of applying. The first time I used it just like this and found that it really didn't darken the fretboard any more than just using a good conditioning oil. However, the next time I applied it heavily, then used a hair dryer to melt the wax on the fretboard a bit and got better results (this is a trick I learned for using shoe polish on boots when I was in the Army).
That’s a good shout. I’ll try that. I have some here. I’m the same as you I found it conditioned it fine but not much color changed. I also have the instrument food. I’m not sure where to use one vs the other
@@johnstephen7610 I only just got notified of this response. I use the hair dryer right after, but it doesn't really matter. By liquifying the product, it helps with penetration into the fretboard.
Really happy with my experience with Montypresso. I had a pretty light Pau Ferro board and it darkened quite well after 2 days. It's still slightly a reddish hue compared to my rosewood board, but I thought it actually paired pretty well with my seafoam green Jazzmaster and yellow headstock. Can't wait to apply a 2nd coat during the next string change!
Used this myself for the last year or so and it's bloody good stuff. Epiphones (with Laurel fretboards) looks especially good after a treatment. As with all things in life, wipe until the paper is clean...
Looks so much better. The wax revitalizes the wood which without lacquer will dry out somewhat over time. My father was a cabinetmaker and he used those type of products often rather than a stain to bring out the natural grain of the wood and to help preserve it to some degree. Great video. 👍☮️🌞🎸❤️
I relic’d my Strat and used this stuff to make the newly exposed wood on the body and the back of the neck look like it had been exposed for years, worked a treat.
I love Monty’s, I have used it, and because of this I am going to dig it out and go another round. It is magical stuff, and is great for Pau Ferro fretboards, to make them look a bit more Rosewoody. And of course…I wipe until the paper is clean
Thanks. Gonna try this. I bought a Gretsch Jet this year and it has an Indian Laurel fretboard that’s a little too light for me. I’ll be sure to cake it on and “wipe until the paper is clean”. 😉👍🏻
Wipe until the paper is clean enough to tab out your favourite riff! This was quite refreshing, and not just for the guitars. Monty seems like a really great chap!
I've used the wax for no more than 40 minutes and it darken my pau ferro boards easily. I love the darker look, but seriously: wipe until the paper is clean, especially around them frets. It's sneaky. It gets everywhere. Also, you should throw that paper away where it can't be seen cuz people will ask questions. That said, it is funny if you tell them to smell it.
This seems really similar to shoe polish. Just formulated for wood instead of leather. Though for shoes you might buff the wax until it shines without wiping it off. In any case, it will leave some pigment in the leather. On second thought, this isn't very much like shoe polish, since this also conditions the wood. You're supposed to condition leather before you use polish, since the wax won't penetrate very far or do a very good job of conditioning.
I used 2 coats of this on my very pale Pau Ferro fretboard and it darkened & conditioned it beautiful. Either i didn't leave the 1st application on long enough (a few hours) or it was so pale it needed 2 coats! Brilliant stuff.
I believe the word you were looking for at 3:28 was "brevity." _Always_ wipe until the paper is clean. You don’t want any lingering brown stuff. Interesting product, I might have to get some.
I’ve used this stuff on 3 guitars, 2 with pau ferro fretboards and 1 with Indian laurel. Here’s a summary of my experience with it. First- every piece of wood, even if it’s the same type, behaves differently. I don’t know if it has to do with how played the guitar already is, how much oil is already in the wood, or if it’s just wood being wood. 2-both of the pau ferro boards were fenders. One of them I used steel wool to really clean the board and frets before I treated it, and it darkened significantly more than the other one. Again, don’t know if this was related to the steel wooling or if it was the wood pieces just being different (as stated in 1). C-Indian Laurel absolutely 100% soaks this stuff up better than pau ferro and gets VERY dark. My epi classic worn now has a fretboard that is darker than rosewood but not quite ebony. I think the laurel is a more open grain, or a softer wood? But it got significantly darker. Very pleased with this specific guitar. 4- it’s lasted 3 years so far and hasn’t faded a bit, even with regular play and I have used lemon oil here and there. Can’t recommend this stuff enough. But pro tip, this stuff will get messy. You have to wipe until the paper is clean, otherwise you’ll smear it on to your fingers and clothes and stain them.
I picked up one of new 1961 vintage ii strats in olympic white and I have the same issue with the fretboard! Love the guitar, wish it had a darker rosewood. I just ordered some for myself, thank you Andy. I'll have to be sure to wipe until the paper is clean.
It really brought out the grain on those fretboards, especially on the strat. Would be very interesting to see how it works on a pao ferro board as they're increasingly common but I find their reddish colour to clash with my personal tastes. Now if you'll excuse me, I must wipe until the paper is clean.
Just got my Montypresso wax today. Got a couple guitars with Pau Ferro finger boards I want to darken up considerably. Can't wait to get it caked on. Cheers for the video. I always wipe until the paper is clean 👌🏻
New subscriber! In the guidelines before posting this comment you say ‘It’s just guitars…’ I’m reminded of Bill Shankly’s quote about football! 😉 Anyway… just ordered some Montypresso for a LP Standard, an R0 and a pau ferro Tele neck - can’t wait to see the results! And what’s that? ‘Wipe until the paper’s clean?’ That line is the sh!t!
My favorite method to _blacken_ a fretboard is India ink. It dries in minutes. The best part is to use 0000 steel wool and buff it to a low sheen. Makes the black a bit silvery. Looks like carbon. (not carbon fiber) Pencil lead is close color. Looked so good i did a whole bass and it looks awesome. There is a video on my YT channel of the finished look. Also, good idea to fix it with some polyurethane so it wont rub off with sweaty hands. Just a light coat.
I have to say that I find this stuff great for conditioning but made little difference to darkening my fretboards (on two guitars) and multiple applications made no difference as far as I could see. I did however have great results from stripping any old oil out the fretboard with lighter fluid (just a little!), carefully painting with India Ink (dilute to taste) and letting it dry, using a cotton bud with a touch of bleach to take any excess ink off the clay dots and then using Montypresso to recondition and bring out the grain again. At first it looks like some of the extra darkness is around the frets but after a couple of weeks of playing, this disappears and the colour becomes much more even but much darker than it was originally. But like I say, as a conditioner, the Montypresso is great and needs less reapplication than just something like lemon oil.
I would have liked for you to leave it on for 1 minute for comparisons. Also maybe some side by side shots. I’m not too convinced about this stuff. It seems like a temporary thing and the marketing to apply loads of the compound also seems like a great tactic for one to continually buy more. Love the channel! Just an opinion.
Wipe until the paper is clean is indeed some of the best advice one can give. Quick question Andy, would multiple applications continue to darken the wood? Great video as always
I'm not saying that Andy. Vile. Cool video! I spent a few days last week conditioning some fretboards and lamenting their overall lightness. I'll keep this in mind in future, looks like a great product!
I have a tin of Relic wax, I used it sparingly on my Epiphone Coronet and it had a good effect. But next time I change the strings I will slap it on as you did and then of course wipe until the paper is clean.
Love how it really pulled the grain up out of that wood, very nice. I have a very light RW board on my ‘59 lp I’ll probably try it out on. Also have a dark RW board on my strat, I don’t know if it will darken it but I’d love to see what kind of grain I could get out of it. The only downside is in the States with shipping included it’s around 40 bucks for a tin but oh well. Great video!
I had great fast results darkening my Les Paul and Tele with Lemon oil(Dunlop Fretboard 65). I applied it liberally and let it soak in for about five ten minutes then wiped it down real good. Waited about an hour or two and applied another coat. Looks awesome still after about a year now. Nice and dark but still can see the grain variations. Both my necks are rosewood, so they were not as light as these two to begin with, but now they are nice and dark.
Don't forget the bridge on that acoustic. You can clean any board with 0000 steel wool, which also polishes the frets. Then oil or "Monty" as you will. Your board looks better!
Wipe until the paper's clean! Well I'd always thought I was alone, but now I know I'm not the only person with an aversion to sticky fingers and hands! I thought of starting a support group, but I had Mango chutney with my curry and you can guess the rest.
Looks fantastic mate. Wiping until the paper is clean is always solid advice! Might be a slightly out there thought buuuut how do you think the back of (or all) an unfinished maple neck would take it? 🤔 Say as a slightly simpler alternative using a tung oil finish or something similar? I've got an Iron Label project lined up that I'd like to do something different with on the neck after a good old sand. Cheers man!
@@TheGuitarGeek You’re a legend, thank you mate! That’s super kind of you to check 🤘 If he gives the go ahead I will let you know how it goes. Thanks again!
I might be crazy but couldn't see any difference regarding the fretboard darkness, the wood seems conditioned, what might be the reason the wood grain is popping out, however, it didn't make it darker. Also it would give us a better idea of effectiveness if you had shown both before and after pics in the same frame... From what I saw you could get the same result using a fretboard conditioner having half of the job and way less messy.
I didn't know about this kind of products. The fingerboard looks fantastic. Thx for the demo and I am curious about how long it gonna last. Wipe until the paper is clean.
I saw Matt using it in one of his vids and the amount he slathered on was a wtf moment, lol. I think he's used it on the back of sanded necks too, to make white maple look grimey and aged. Wipe until the papers clean!
That Atkin sounds stunning. “Wipe until the paper is clean” needs a qualification - *NOT* the same piece you started with. (That would be potentially horrific).
@@TheGuitarGeek Yeah, not a good response to a valid criticism and not one that tends to engender a desire to continue frequenting your channel. Visual comparisons tend to be done by placing objects together so they can be viewed at the same time, dodge that fact as you will. Monty's deserves better and so do their products, which works very well as evidenced by the side-by-side comparison they themselves made. Easy. No ambiguity. But please, feel free to do ten minute buildup videos with snakeoil saleman payoff endings and providing snarky responses to your viewers, I won't be one of them.
The difference is minimal. I tried all sorts of products to darken the anaemic looking pau ferro fret board on my MIM Precision Bass. Eventually I found the best solution was Old English Scratch Cover for dark woods---about 5 or 6 applications, followed by a couple of applications of Howard Feed-n-Wax the next day. Now it is darker than the "real" rosewood board on my 23 year old Strat.
100% it can! But I would love an update after couple of months of playing the guitars. Will it hold or will you end up with ugly bleak spots where you play.
@_AndyFerris Wow, this is great! I have my credit card ready, you need those three numbers on the back and expiration date, right? Anything else? Thank you so much Fakeandy!
Used this a few times, it does work well on extremely light pau ferro but needs to be caked and left a long time. The downside to it though is longterm ive found it does change the feel of the wood, it leaves a strange residue like feel that isnt particularly nice
Did you consider removing the "wax until the paper is clean" or using a buffer . Now I would have used a buffer using a tool similar to your string winder which I have because I get very sore fingers due to arthritis and old age Talking about age If you want to darken you control knobs leave them in a cup of coffee overnight . 2 sweetners in mine please ..I make my own electrics because it's fun and I'm a lefty and using the old brain I can shape the body to my desire.
So my first thought was, "that looks like a shoe polish container ... do people use shoe polish of fretboards? " 1 minute in google told me this trick was some what old (posts dating back to the beginning of public internet) with mixed results depending on brand. Presumably chemical make-up is important and maybe this product has taken the best-of from that experience. I don't know , of course, it's my instinct reaction typed as a comment.
Big fan of a dark rosewood board & ebony. I'm not a fan of a heavily patterned rosewood board though, I see a lot of people saying how beautiful it looks & yes granted it does look nice but for some reason I prefer less of a grain pattern on my rosewood, I've recently purchased an Allparts JGRO Neck with the darkest rosewood board I've ever had its a beauty. Have you ever used this on Indian Laurel? (Think that's how its spelt) or on a Pao Fauro board? I'd love to see the results on these cheaper alternatives as its the light boards that annoy me on say a Squire, I'd still buy the guitar but I'd be constantly moaning on the inside about the fretboard lol
Just oiling the fretboard will make it darker for a while, so I'm curious how the Montypresso compares to simple lemon oil, or other fretboard conditioners. I'm planning on testing this myself, so we'll see.
If someone is blind, how do they know when to stop wiping because the paper is clean? I really need an answer to this! Also, I loved how much the wax made the wood grain on those fretboards pop.
Isn't it bad to put waxy products on fretboard it does look good but every tech I've talked to always said not to use waxy products like cleaning your fretboard with pledge
It's also great if you want to relic the back of a neck, just remember to wipe until the paper is clean, otherwise you get brown montypresso all over everything.
@@TheGuitarGeek You’re a sweet man, and we all love you. Doing very well… I am uploading a piece of music every day on my other channel… Either an instrumental or song. I’m just putting my latest video together now. So I’m having a wonderful time. Happy Holidays!🎁🎄❄️
If the paper is not clean when you start you will never be able to "Wipe until the paper is clean". If you manage this however reply with exactly how many wipes it took.
