I just got done chatting online with a young man I watched grow up in the church I and his family attended. He's in the military, doing a year in Mosul, Afghanistan> He tells me his guitar got stolen in transit from the US, and wanted to know if I had one I could sell him.
I am considering sending him my Line 6 setup, Variax 600 & POD XT Live, as he says he mostly wants to record stuff on his computer. The only question I have is, how well will this digital stuff stand up to dust? He says it's everywhere and in everything over there. I don't want to send him something that's gonna pack up on him, especially a guitar that only works digitally.
What do you guys think?

I'd be cautious...

A Pandora might be small enough to wrap up & protect easily.

G.

Yeah- that's commendably generous and kind of you, picker!!- but I'd seek out what Line 6 themselves might think there.

For that matter, ask your friend how their electrical and electronic gear is holding up under local conditions there, their laptops and communications gear and all.

The dust is an issue, and I'd try to make it as simple a rig as possible. But more importantly, will you actually be able to -get- it there? The dissappearnce of musical gear in transit is not incidental. Insure it for stupid money.

The biggest problem for dust is any point of electrical CONTACT. This is jacks/plugs and switches/pots for the most part. As long as it is not conductive or corrosive(which sand/dirt is not), then it will have no affect on circuit boards or electrical components.

Contacting surfaces can be cleaned with electrical contact cleaner and/or compressed air. If he knows anything about electronics, he can do this himself.

let me add - for significant cost, you can retrofit with "Sealed" switches and pots. Jacks/Plugs would still be an issue.

You have no idea how bad the dust can be if this is Afghanistan. In Kandahar the dust was so fine it completely stopped up my pores the day we performed at the Airfield. It was the finest dirt/sand I've ever encountered. My shirt looked like a vacuum bag that had become saturated with fine dust.

I would not recommend sending anything other than an inexpensive electric guitar. The Pandora would be an excellent piece to limit exposure to the elements no matter where this soldier might be. I love mine (PX3) and brought it with me on that trip.

I thought of you and your time out there when I first saw this thread, Neil!

If you keep a Pandora in one of those 'zip-up' polythene bags, you could run the cables in & out of it and never really take it out.

G.

Yeah, but the dust would get in any seam in your guitar and could potentially futz up the pots, etc. We were only there one day. I wouldn't want to deal with that dust day in and day out let alone subject my electric guitar to it.

Take a cheap guitar, I suppose - over here that would probably be an Encore.

G.