Hofner Green/blue corrosion on pickups (mainly)

[Scottie T Hutt]

Anyone else have this green blue pickup corrosion on their German made Höfner reissue v63? I heard it’s the gas from the pick guard. I removed the pick guard and removed the guitar from the case. Now I want to clean the corrosion off as much as possible. What should I use? Also my G string has taken on some of the same corrosion too. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[bassdude51]

Cleaning oxidation on Hofner 500/1?

Celluloid pickguard = Hofner pickup corrosion


Celluloid pickguard = Hofner pickup corrosion | TalkBass.com
www.talkbass.com › ... › General Forums [BG] › Basses [BG]Feb 1, 2016 - many are. The culprit appears to be a gas given off by the celluloid pickguard as it slowly decomposes, which reacts with the plating on the pickups.
Cleaning oxidation on Hofner 500/1?
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May 22, 2012

This is one of the best metal polish on the market. It's made in Germany. You can probably buy a tube of it from eBay.

simichrome polish | eBay

 

[Scottie T Hutt]

Thanks so much for the heads up.

 

[GIBrat51]

If you're getting a waxy green tarnish on your pick up covers - and on anything else metal? That's verdigris, and it's caused by a reaction from the copper in the metal. Which isn't exactly nickel; it's "German Silver"; traditionally a nickel/copper/tin or zinc alloy that I'm very familiar with. A lot of surveying and drafting instruments are made from the stuff. It will get that way all by itself if you let it, but a celluloid pickguard deteriorating in the guitar case certainly won't do the stuff any good. So, yeah; taking the pick guard off, or not keeping the bass in it's case is good advice. Simichrome will shine it up just fine; personally, I don't use it for much besides polishing motorcycle exhaust pipes (an old biker trick to get the bluing off the chrome). For everything else? I use this stuff;

It just works better, IMO; it's less messy; and a can will last you half a lifetime...

 

[Scottie T Hutt]

Thank you so much for the information. I will definitely pick up some of this.

 

[fhm555]

...Simichrome will shine it up just fine; personally, I don't use it for much besides polishing motorcycle exhaust pipes (an old biker trick to get the bluing off the chrome). For everything else? I use this stuff;
View attachment 3748701 It just works better, IMO; it's less messy; and a can will last you half a lifetime...

I can't remember when I first heard this but a guy told me if your pipes blue, clean them with Simichrome, then paint them inside with header paint. I used to do it to all my (thin) aftermarket Triumph TT pipes before I mounted them and it worked a treat.

 

[Pier_]

I'm resurrecting this old topic because I've had the same issue, and this topic (and others here on Talkbass) helped me a lot.

I didn't know that the Hofner's pickguard was made of nitrocellulose, and in the last months I closed my two violins, a Reissue 62 Mersey (2008) and a Reissue 61 Cavern (more recent, can't remember the year) in their cases.
last week I opened the cases to record a couple of lines with these basses, and found a lot of oxidation on the pickups, the G string (Pyramid Gold) lost it's shine near the pickguard, and some oxidation even on the stop-tail.

now, the Reissue 62 have always had some opacity on the pickups, and I thought it was just for the nickel finish (I bought it used) and never cared to polish them, but the G string became black and felt rough in that area.

the Reissue 61 was also bought used, but the previous owner used to keep it hung on the wall, and it was all shiny and perfect an year ago.
this one was found in worse conditions, with green tarnish on the side of the pickups and a lot of opacity on the top of them.

what I found was this:

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

thanks to this wonderful forum and some other online sources I found out that I could restore both of them I picked up a Metarex polish from Thomann (here in Italy I couldn't find anything like Duraglit or Nevr-Dull, but this Metarex is the same product) and yesterday I cured both basses with a lot of rubbing.

I also restored the G strings on both of them, and polished the teacups.

here are them:

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

New item by Pierfrancesco Sanò

photos.app.goo.gl

I'm so grateful to this forum

after all these porn pics, I have some questions:

1) if I keep them out of the cases, will I elude this problem?

2) does the decomposition of the celluloid decrease? I've noticed that the '62 (from 2008), even if older and kept in the case for longer didn't get more oxidation than the day I bought it. the '61 (recent) started developing the green and rough oxidation and the G string corroded a lot more.

I'd like to keep the pickguards on, because I like them on these basses, but if there's the risk to ruin the instruments or I'll need to polish them too much, I'll keep them without it.

thanks!

 

[/\/\3phist0]

If you're getting a waxy green tarnish on your pick up covers - and on anything else metal? That's verdigris, and it's caused by a reaction from the copper in the metal. Which isn't exactly nickel; it's "German Silver"; traditionally a nickel/copper/tin or zinc alloy that I'm very familiar with. A lot of surveying and drafting instruments are made from the stuff. It will get that way all by itself if you let it, but a celluloid pickguard deteriorating in the guitar case certainly won't do the stuff any good. So, yeah; taking the pick guard off, or not keeping the bass in it's case is good advice. Simichrome will shine it up just fine; personally, I don't use it for much besides polishing motorcycle exhaust pipes (an old biker trick to get the bluing off the chrome). For everything else? I use this stuff;
View attachment 3748701 It just works better, IMO; it's less messy; and a can will last you half a lifetime...

I also swear by that stuff.
Lately if been using:

Amazon.com

With good results.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

If the corrosion was coming from nitrocellulose plastic deteriorating, and I don’t know what plastic the Hofner reissues use for pickguards and binding, keeping the basses out of their cases will help to some extent. The plastic will still off gas and deteriorate but corrosion won’t happen as fast.

As far as why one is worse it’s most likely a different batch. Some old Guilds or Gretsches have bad binding rot and some only have a little.

 

[sissy kathy]

If you're getting a waxy green tarnish on your pick up covers - and on anything else metal? That's verdigris, and it's caused by a reaction from the copper in the metal. Which isn't exactly nickel; it's "German Silver"; traditionally a nickel/copper/tin or zinc alloy that I'm very familiar with. A lot of surveying and drafting instruments are made from the stuff. It will get that way all by itself if you let it, but a celluloid pickguard deteriorating in the guitar case certainly won't do the stuff any good. So, yeah; taking the pick guard off, or not keeping the bass in it's case is good advice. Simichrome will shine it up just fine; personally, I don't use it for much besides polishing motorcycle exhaust pipes (an old biker trick to get the bluing off the chrome). For everything else? I use this stuff;
View attachment 3748701 It just works better, IMO; it's less messy; and a can will last you half a lifetime...

Yeah this is good stuff. Pull a wad off, use it, and store that piece in a separate container. It turns black, or at least darker when used, but once in the container will lose quite a bit of the dark color, you can then use that piece again, and again.