How do I polish a Tortoise pickguard

[Ken Desiata]

Just picked up a 1930's Gisbon L 30. Removed all the hardware to give the guitar a good cleaning. The cellulose pickguard is very cloudy......is there a way to polish?
Thanks. Oh ya the guitar is complete.....all origonal hardware,tuners etc. but I wonder about the truss rod cover......It is black single ply and has the name " Jimmie Oliver "on it , Has anyone seen this cover on any guitar?

[Brent Hutto]

Tortoise pickguard you say?

Surely you'd use nothing other than Turtle Wax!

[Tim Mace]

And a shamwow

[Ken Desiata]

You guys are too funny. ha,ha.thanks for the help.

[Greg Mirken]

The safest thing to do with a 70+-year-old pickguard is to leave it alone. Polishing won't help the cloudiness, because it goes all the way through the guard, and indicates that it is deteriorating. There isn't anything you can do to stop it, as far as I know.

[Ned Knepp]

This sounds like out gassing to me too. It's probably getting fairly brittle in places. You should take a close look at the mounting points to make sure it isn't crystallizing enough to break. I don't know how to restore it but the ones that I've seen that are left on "Players" are often broken because they are so brittle. I know some people that remove/ replace them so they can "preserve" the original but still comfortable play the instrument.

Ned

[Cliff Morris]

Take a look at archtop.com. He has developed sources for vintage electronics and also pickguards for various classic archtops. I believe he recommends getting the deteriorating guard off the guitar and out of the case as the outgassing fumes are not good for the instrument in a number of ways.

[Ken Desiata]

Thanks for the replies guys! I have left the guard off for now. I plan on playing this guitar. It just seemed to me I could clean it up because the face was scratched and faded and underside looked new and clear. I'll put it away. Thanks again.