How do you clean your ukulele?

Martinlover

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This may be a dumb question but here goes: How do you clean your Ukulele body? I want to wipe the fingerprints and some spatter (don’t know where it came from) off my gloss Pono. And how are people cleaning oil rubbed bodies? Damp cloth, okay? Or is there a better way? Don’t want to scratch anything either.
 
I just cleaned mine yesterday, which happens at every string change.
I use a liquid guitar cleaner, and really get after it with a soft cloth that has not been used for other things.
Then I polish the whole uke with a guitar polish, I don't skimp, I rub it hard, because my uke gets scratch marks from my nails. I rub it all off with a different clean cloth.
Except for the fretboard. After it's clean, I won't use anything other than LoPrinzi fret board butter.
I don't use any furniture polish, and I sure don't use lemon oil. It leaves a film, and opens the pores of the wood.
 
I didn't know LoPrinzi made a fretboard butter. I've been using Blue Bonnet. Just kidding (lame, I know). I have actually been using Ernie Ball fretboard conditioner, which comes in the form of individually-wrapped wipes, with a nice lemon scent. They have worked really well (for the fretboard ONLY).
 
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If you have a French Polish finish; be very careful using anytype of cleaner like Virtuoso Cleaner. It'll take the finish right off if left on too long.
 
I just use a damp cloth, the dish cloth actually, and I don't think to clean them unless I look at them and they look pretty bad or if I had it out on the beach. I'll wipe them off sometimes if I'm going out somewhere to play. One is matt and two are gloss. But I am not too concerned about scratches and such, none of the three are in pristine condition, so don't take my advise if you are. But I don't think that I've ever put a noticeable scratch in one of them doing so. As soon as I wipe them down with the damp cloth, I dry them off with a towel. That's about it. I scrub the fretboard clean with an old toothbrush and wipe mineral oil on it when I change strings, or if they start to look dry.
 
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I clean the body of one of my ukes with a damp dish rag as though it was a counter top because it's made out of counter top material. :D
 
I use a damp micro fiber cloth. The micro fiber cloth is the secret.
 
I use the same thing on my 1935 Gibson L-12 as I do with my 2018 Kamaka Tenor: a simple soft cloth.
Occasionally I will apply a breath on the top if it needs a wee bit of moisture. All cleaners are abrasive, so I avoid them.
That said, I will use some fretboard conditioner at the beginning of the dry season. Otherwise, keep it natural.
 
soft, clean cotton cloth, dampened with water. Tough stuff...like really tough stuff, I'll use a spot of naptha on the cloth.

I cleaned the grungy fretboard of a 1920s tenor banjo the other day with a cloth, a soft toothbrush, and naptha. Once it was dry, I followed up with a scant few drops of sesame oil rubbed in very well with the cotton cloth. A few decades worth of finger schmutz and who knows what was caked around the frets....it's like a new instrument now. I might lightly oil a fretboard once a year or so...and only if it's looking too dry.
 
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I have a 50's Martin tenor and I don't know what kind of finish it is but it must be very soft because any kind of guitar polish (even recommended by my music store) seems to take the finish right off. Maybe it's french polish, I don't know. Anyway it is getting pretty grungy so I'm afraid to use any kind of cleaner now. Maybe some mild soap and water?
 
After about a year I just had to replace my eyeglasses. I keep them in a case when I'm not wearing them, and am not hard on them when I am. But I cleaned them sometimes with a tiny bit of dish detergent and water. The minute scratches caused by the detergent looked like greasy smears, which I tried harder to remove, and with more soap.

Ukulele finishes being at least as variable as optical coatings, I'd be extremely wary of anything stronger than a damp microfiber cloth. Everything may look great the first few times, but cumulatively you could be doing damage that looks like smudges, and which you continue to try to fix with polish, continually adding to the problem.

Fretboards are a different story. They can get pretty gross, but an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure, washing your hands before playing and a quick rub down with the damp cloth after if you have sweaty hands, should help a lot. Intuitively, it seems most oils would be safe, but intuition led me to the kitchen sink to clean my glasses, so I don't particularly trust myself on that.
 
going to say microfibre, but others have beat me to it. Don't know if its good, just assumed would do no harm ....
 
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