The tuners were probably the most troublesome, as the original machine grease had dried and hardened, leaving them quite tight and sticky. A couple treatments of Fret Doctor over a week or so brought the bone dry rosewood fretboard back to life. The finish and hardware cleaned up nicely with a few naphtha baths and some heavy elbow grease using Virtuoso Cleaner (this stuff is magic on nitro finishes), and the volume and tone pots gradually loosened up with copious applications of DeOxit. Over time the string tension had pulled the nut about 1/4" down, so that had to be knocked off and reset properly. Other than some heavy basement grime it was in remarkably good condition, having been subjected to very little playing wear. It was picked up new by my uncle as a teen in about '77, and he'd lost interest in playing soon after. After some serial number and volume pot research along with some back and forth with Gibson customer service, I determined it's most likely a late 1975 build in preparation for the 1976 model year reissue. So a few weeks ago I found an old Gibson Explorer that had been sitting un-cased on a shelf in my aunt's & uncle's basement for as long as either of them could remember.
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