Buff out wear on ebanol fingerboard?

[lemmywinks]

Havig a clearout and decided to part out my bitsa fretless, been playing it with roundwounds for years and the ebanol fingerboard has picked up a bit of wear, mainly paler streaks down the length of it.

 

Is there anything I could do to polish/buff these out? With ebanol being paper/resin I thought some sort of car buffing compound would work but don't want to ruin it through stupidity!

[tommorichards]

As I'm not too sure how bad the wear is, but I'd recommend lemon oil, (Dunlop make the most popular one), and some 0000 grade wire wool to buff it out. If the colour is still not right, get some dark leather dye and apply it to the fingerboard. That should do it.

[lemmywinks]

I'm not sure lemon oil would do much to ebanol as it isn't wood, this thread mentioned car buffing compound:

https://www.talkbass.com/threads/polishing-ebonol.955567/

 

The neck is the same as mine, a Mighty Mite unlined ebanol board with white marks from using roundwounds. I've decided to buy a new bridge and wire it up as a piezo free passive bass to sell as a complete instrument now so maybe a bit of player wear is less of an issue.

Edited September 25, 2022 by lemmywinks

[A.G.E.N.T.E.]

A couple of months ago I asked my local luthier to remove the scratches of an ebonol fretboard of my Ibanez gwb35. Don't ask me how he did it but it came out pretty well. I was a bit skeptical because I thought it would get even worse from sanding. 

[Bunion]

 

[lemmywinks]

Thanks, I did have a quick test with some buffing compound and a cloth which got good results, doesn't sound like mine is as bad as that, just some grey streaks and the odd bit of wear.