Cleaning the Entire guitar

Yep just don't egnite it - it burns off your eyebrows and slow cooks your guitar, we learned that from Nick.

So... The olive oil I currently have in my cupboard would work just fine then?

Yep.

I recently bought a Yahama kit that has a fretboard oil and a guitar polish. The ingredients is listed as petroleum distillates. There is enough in that kit to last for a couple of years of weekly cleaning. I am leary about using household products on my guitar finish. All instructions i have read warns against using furnituere wax and home cleaning products. I was going to paint a window sill once that had been treated with linseed oil and the whole surface of the sill was as soft as rubber,the surface was ruined and would not accept paint. I definantely would not use anything that was not fromulated especially for the guitars type of finish. 5 to 7 bucks for a kit is cheap compaired to a ruined fretboard or a guitars finish.Thats something i won't experiment with.

Quick question. I have a vintage tremolo system on my Silvertone strat copy. My instructor reminded me a coupe of weeks ago that it might "pull up" if I take all  the strings off.

Any good ideas that will allow me to clean the fretboard and all without encountering this problem?

I was going to paint a window sill once that had been treated with linseed oil and the whole surface of the sill was as soft as rubber,the surface was ruined and would not accept paint.

That's why you don't use linseed oil. Olive oil won't do that. It's not experimenting, I've been using it for years. As for household products like furniture wax, they're made to be used on products finished with the same types of finishes used on guitars. They're not harmful. Any guitar maker who warns against using them is selling their own "special guitar polish." As pointed out in another thread in this forum, Fender guitar paint is automotive paint. That's why the folks who like to use automotive polishes and waxes find they work so well. Certainly there are stupid things you can do that will mess up a guitar's finish, or your coffee table's. For example, you could think "if lemon oil's good for my fretboard, this orange oil would be great stuff!" "Lemon oil" isn't stuff that comes from lemons. It's lemon scented light mineral oil, same as baby oil with a different smell. REAL citrus oil extracted from citrus peels, orange, lemon, whatever, is a powerful organic solvent that's used to clean things like gunky bicycle chains. It'll strip many finishes right off in seconds.

But don't think there's anything special about guitar finishes because they're on guitars. They're all standard, common finishes. You just need to know what kind of finish you're working with. It's certainly a way to play safe to use approved products from the guitar makers, but it's not necessary.

Do you only use the carmaker's brand of motor oil in your car? Lots of folks do, because it's recommended in the manual and by the dealer. Of course, the carmakers buy generic oil that meets their minimum specs from the lowest bidding vendor and put their label on it. Same way the guitar makers get their branded cleaning products.