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I did this to get more comfortable with the idea of doing extreme repairs like neck resets (practice on scrap!).

Thought some of ya'll would be interested to see. Don't worry I bought the guitar to purposefully take it apart. I thought the joint was rather interesting

The method was one that I've only read about, saw the fretboard off at the body, remove the fingerboard extension and apply hot water to the joint to loosen the glue. The glue in this neck joint was epoxy or something else. I knew that steaming this joint would not likely be easy and plus I just like taking things apart radically. I won't be using this method on something that's actually worth it like a Martin I assure you.

I really don't think the makers intended the neck to ever be removed, the tenon was cut in such a way that it literally would not allow you to lift it conventionally straight up out of the guitar, instead it HAD to come out vertically. It was messy, hot, and gluey but it came out albeit with pullout. Now that my initial fear of removing an acoustic neck is over now, I feel a bit accomplished haha!

So... are you gonna fix it back together?
I'm wondering how to get the fretboard back together.

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Not on this one. There was simply no reason to put it back together (too cheap and far too many other problems) and thus I took it as a chance to overcome some fears and I'll save the pictures to show people why and how some guitars can be repaired easily and others cannot.

The dovetail was to keep the neck from creeping out of the joint, I guess.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I've done it this way a few times myself in the past. It was a more common type repair, to saw off the fretboard at the body joint. There is no reason why you cannot put it back together, it's been done this way many many times. A sort of upscale 2.0 version of this method however is to saw off at the fret just before the body fret, so for example the 13th fret on a 14 fret guitar. That way there is some structure to the joint over the body joint.

That's definitely a crazy joint. A sort of reverse hybrid bolt on dove tail tenon something or other joint.

Wow....bizarre. Its like someone took all the down-sides of the various neck joints and combined them into one.
All the fussiness of fitting a dovetail in a bolt on design. Then glued so you can't remove it without cutting and steaming. Some type of reverse genius design

Hey look. Somebody invented a completely new way to make a guitar neck joint that will never need a neck reset ever... Again.

I ran into this joint on a friend's Conn--my, what a surprise that was!

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https://soundcloud.com/jeffreylsuits/he ... -runnin-13

This is what we call an unserviceable joint and as you suspect it was never intended to be reset AND has little value in resetting because the economics of the repair do not match the value gleaned once the repair is complete.... unless you do it yourself and don't mind the time spent.

Anyway cutting the fret board is very much frowned upon these days and not done in the better commercial shops. When I say better more specifically I mean the folks who get out once in a while and understand how techniques have changed over time with Lutherie just as they often do with any pursuit.

There is no value beyond amusing you perhaps in resetting this kind of joint because it is highly unlikely that you will ever do it again. It is learning to do something obsolete so to speak.

Old Harmony guitars with proper dovetails are the preferred ax for new neck resetters to pick-up and reset because of the dovetail and how the methods needed will also succeed with Martins and G*bson's etc.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Yes Hesh I have a few of those old Harmonies of which you speak. Have done a few re-sets. The sawing of the fretboard is so you don't have to remove the whole fretboard to prevent an inevitable bump when resetting.
I find it easier to just remove the fretboard completely. You don't have humps. I've found with the old Harmonies that there's not much wrong with the necks. By using a little thin hardwood to tighten the joint up you can return it to factory new condition without changing angles. The factory used very sloppy mortise and tenon joints. Fill er up with glue and clamp it down. Just by crafting the joint a little more meticulously you can return it to perfect.


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Hesh, I understand, part of doing this was to overcome some fear on my part for taking a neck off of an acoustic. A nice bonus will be the ability to show this to people to explain why certain things literally cannot be done.