Use a jackhammer on it.

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1984 Squier Contemporary Stratocaster
1986 Peavey Envoy 110
1967 Kingston Acoustic

Break out the belt sander!



Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

Take it to town and throw it off the tallest building you can find.
----Danny,

Let it wear naturally. Relicing looks terrible.

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1984 Squier Contemporary Stratocaster
1986 Peavey Envoy 110
1967 Kingston Acoustic

you could try a handfull of random nuts and bolt sizes... just hold them in your hand and smack the edges a bit. the drop them on the top and on the back. drop more where you get belt rash and for rubbing the finish off sanding doesn't look natural to me. but if you just have to do it you could try a linen buffing wheel at high speed. that would take the paint off but not the wood. would look more realistic. but doing it for real over time is the fun part it shows your experience

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All relicing looks intentional to me, even the custom shop ones. If you go into a large Guitar Center with a vintage room and look at the real old timers, it's obvious you can't rush that natural patina of age and use. Just use it often and never put it in a case, it'll look old pretty quick.

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'10 American Deluxe HSS Sunset Metallic
'10 JA-90 Thinline Telecaster
'15 Music Man JP-15 Blueberry Burst
'07 Les Paul Standard Faded LCPG #82
'14 Carvin ST300
'12 Carvin CS424S
'66 Guild Starfire IV w/Bigsby
'14 Warmouth Partscaster Daphne Blue

If you gotta do it...tie it to the back of a car, I figure a half mile or so should do the trick

T2

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What time is it? It's Fender Time.

There are a couple of things Fender leaves out on their relic treatment that you often see, feel and often can actually smell on genuine vintage stuff. First on the headstock, a cigarette burn between the nut and E string tuner plus headstock tip dings and cymbal marks. Rusty screws & hardware for another. Slight cracks in the pickguards around a screw or two caused by expansion and contraction which also causes finish crazing and just plain funky good old fashioned dirt. More buckle rash than Fender puts and jean rivet rash too in the right spots which they don't do at all.

If you give your instrument the Jaco Pastorius treatment long enough (take it naked and caseless everywhere you go rain or shine/heat or cold) then it will get all these things, except the cig burn which is easy enough to fake. When you like the wear you have achieved by your caseless inseparability with your instrument, you are done. Until then take it to dinner and a movie via a ride on a city bus for example, take it on the subway, take it in a taxi, take it fishing, take it to an amusement park or the zoo, take it to parties and take it with you when you go to a nightclub. If you get tired of toting it around make arrangements to give it a "vacation" at a local cigar bar for 2 weeks hanging somewhere out of sight where nobody can get to it but the smoke. The next "vacation" for it should be in a greasy spoon diner hanging again where customers can't see it but the grease in the air will reach it. These "vacations" will accelerate a naturally aged patina and the unmistakeable vintage odor of the life of a gigging instrument. Finally after the wear looks right, the smoke looks right and the grease smells just right, put it in direct sunlight religiously, rotating front to back each sunny day, until you notice the finish and perhaps the pickguard color actually starts to change. When that happens you are done. It worked for Jaco.

The only money I'd consider spending is to replace the stock bridge with a Fender Threaded Vintage Bridge with the screw type threads on the barrels. They are about $30. Fender part number 099-0804-100. The barrel threads get a fuzzy rust on them that is totally unique to them and I'm instantly drawn to get a closer look at any instrument with fuzzy bridge barrels. Just remove and repeatedly soak all the hardware in water and let it stand to dry to accelerate the rust effect.

After you are pleased, just keep it in a case after that. I wouldn't put ANYTHING on it. Else you'll risk removing some of the FUNK you worked hard to put on it.

I just wouldn't leave the instrument on a park bench unattended for 30 seconds. We all know what happens when you do that.