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Guys I've just had a lovely dinner with my neighbors and their New Zealand daughter and grand-daughter and chatting away and was asked to get my guitar and show them plus some other stuff I've made anyway as we were chatting the dad went savaging and found the daughters old EKO which was bought when she lived in Spain and the landlady said the wind blew over. I has had a botched repair in the past I've done this job once on a fresh break, but have no idea how to remove the old glue, which I think is a Cascamite type or some sort of acid catalyst.

Help

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes

Right as no-one has jumped in here to help if I list my procedure I intend to follow can you tell me if I'm wrong.

1. I'm going to try a clean as much old glue off using a powered wire brush gently
2. I intend to remove the machine heads and screw it to a board make an angled piece for the fret board to rest on and strap that down too
3. Clamp the 2 parts together
4. The loop some string between the machine head holes and the tenon of the bolt on neck and use it as a tourniquet to further tighten the two parts together
5. This I'll do lightly dry
6. Repeat above but using araldite precision as an epoxy adhesive
7. Route 2 small channels in the back of the break say 1" past the break in both directions
8. Glue in 2 splines

That'll do for the physical repair once complete I'll try and provide photos to ask about repairs to the finish to try and blend it in as much as possible

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes

Photos would help a lot. FRETS.com has a bunch of cool articles about bad headstock breaks. The routed out spline in the back of the neck method seems kind of out of fashion,

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Luthier ... erlay.html

this is a bit more elegant, and finish touchup is actually a bit easier than trying to hide routed in splines, they never seem to dissapear.

Your glue up seems pretty good, glue really makes everything slippery and want to wedge away from where you want it, as long as you stop the headstocks tendency to wander north you should be ok. This is what your strings are for, yes? A workboard with a stop for the headstock can work also, sometimes i put wire brads through the joint if i will be backstrapping or replacing the face veneer and the brad holes will be hidden.

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Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

Are we talking about an electric EKO surf machine? I love those things.

Like i said before, it is hard to recommend anything without pictures.

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Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

No it's a D-30 Acoustic

Photos of the break

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes

Ouch, nasty break on a cool looking headstock. Looks like a prime candidate for the frank ford treatment from the article posted.

It is hard to tell from the picture, is the EKO label a decal or inlaid in some way? In breaks like these it is good to replace the front veneer for added strength, but you dont want to loose the deco/eko thing. On instruments with pearl inlay, i dig the pearl out and re-inlay it into the new headstock veneer, maybe you could do something like that.

On bad breaks like that, with glue contamination and especially if big chunks are missing, i sometimes scarf on a whole new heastock IF there is enough material under the nut to plane a glueing surface. I then run ears right up to the nut, then backstrapping and a new front veneer, and then use the old headstock as a pattern to shape the new wood. It doesnt look like you have enough to work with to make that a good option, i just thought i would bring it up.

Good luck, when a job like that turns out nice, it really feels good.

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Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

Not sure it's a real candidate for a new headstock veneer the EKO decal is part of a plastic headstock veneer, so not easily removable, and there is less than an inch of headstock veneer between the nut and break. Which is why I thought to go the spline method.

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes

Yeah i understand, it is not ideal in a lot of ways- great big truss rod cavity, horrible glue contamination, plastic headstock veneer, and it is not a super valuable instrument worth dumping money or time into.(i really like cheezy EKO guitars though, there are reasons beyond just $ value to fix something)

It is my understanding that the spline method has been abandoned by most of us for being ineffective, hard to do well and a nightmare to touch up. I used to do it, and i never felt like it was doing everything it should to hold the break together. If someone here has ways to insure that splines really do their job well, it would be nice to hear. The backstrap method to me is clearly superior at reinforcing the break, and after doing lots of splines and recently switching to backstraping i feel that it is actually easier to get a good result, structurally and cosmetically.

By the way, if it was me, i would probably remove the headstock veneer, cut around just the trapezoid shaped bit with the decal and inlay that into a new ebony veneer. Or maybe i wouldnt, it would be a lot of work.

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Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY

I think you could cut around the label and then inlay the whole thing into a new veneer.
Good luck with whatever you decide.

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Keith MacKenzie
Location: Florida
"To err is human to really screw up you need tools"

oops!!!
a little late.

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Keith MacKenzie
Location: Florida
"To err is human to really screw up you need tools"

Here's an update I glued it back together with araldite and have put 2 stainless pins in under the nut and glued them into, now when really stressed I can feel the wood around the joint flexing, now got the fun part of trying to make it less noticeable I think I will drop fill the back of the neck I've been reliably informed I'll be able to find that colour nail varnish and I'll have to fill and repaint the headstock

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Formerly JJH

I learn more from my mistakes than my successes

Cool, back together again. With less valuable guitars, i will sometimes sunburst the headstock to hide nasty damage, it is hard to make something like that dissapear unless you are magical. Sometimes leaving it a little funky is ok too, and can be a reminder that you should not let "the wind" blow your guitar over.

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Jordan Aceto
Ithaca, NY