"It's far too common with this kind of job to 'take away' from the overall mojo - by losing some of the patina or slotting through the bindng on the refret.
I was determined to add, not distract & think I achieved!"
I'm always feel slightly dissapointed when I see an old LP thats lost its nibs during a refret. Baiscally a luthier has two choices - either saw through the binding leaving the ends of the fret tangs showing, or nip the tangs and fit the new frets 'inside' the binding. Of course the latter method risks the fret ends lifting and the dreaded issue of the high E string catching undeneath.
For this 1969/70 Deluxe I wanted to try a different approach: remove the binding and then replace it after fretting (basically rebuild the fingerboard in the same way it was originally constructed) and amber tint the new binding to age it, using the original binding as a pattern. As you can see, the approach worked out perfectly - new frets and perfect nibs. Hopefully she'll last another 50 years! Part of the original Gibson logo was missing so after installing a perfectly cut new MOP logo, I used the same tint to soften the 'bleached' white.
As the guitar arrived, still with original frets
New frets and binding installed with the original binding shown for comparison
After the refret, new binding with nibs tinted down with amber nitro to match the original
As the goldtop had already been stripped, I decided on a burst for the refinish.
