Official Luthiers Forum!

Its kind of hard to watch the progress of the desecration of an old guitar like this.

Second.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

So avert your eyes, folks. It's not your guitar,and it's not "sacred" in any case.

Hold your hat ladies .

What's that shim and drill hole in the block? previous reset?

third! wait ...... desecration .... huh? that must be one dem dare college words. mkay

thanks man, I don't know what there problem is . Im going to make this guitar nice , and play it every day , I guess these guys would buy a car that was leaking oil and say DON'T touch it!

It's not that your guitar has great market value at the moment, or even that it's the best archtop around. Although that could be subjective, of course, especially when transposed in the future.
I assume that if you post your progress on the forum you are open to well meaning comments.
The point is, it's a well built vintage guitar of perhaps historical value, and in the future somebody may look at your work and wish you hadn't done it.
A lot of irreversible modifications that have been made to vintage guitars when they had little market value are now considered anathema. Of course we have the benefit of hindsight, which the no doubt well intentioned repairmen and customers of the past had not.
However the Hippocratic oath "first do no harm" is basic repair ethics, and when modifications are desired or even necessary, they should be reversible, especially on instruments of value. For example, it was possible to repair the top cracks while preserving the sunburst. Even if it's the only part of the finish still salvageable, it's worth the effort. Re-binding with the "correct" replacement has no effect on playability, and so on. In any case good luck on your project, and take your time.

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Laurent Brondel
West Paris, Maine - USA
http://www.laurentbrondel.com/

i hear ya, hey im over in maine too ! small world . thank you for your kind words, this is the biggest project i have taken on , and i will need help and guidance at points , so i hope ya'll can lend a hand from time to time. i have already resigned to the fact i am refinishing this guitar , in 75 years more of play i hope the next guys refinishes it too , and then plays it for 75 years.

For an ethical attitude that should be emulated see Frank Ford's restorations of vintage guitars, like this one:
http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Blogs/1867Martin126/1867Martin126_1.html
And of course his excellent and unequalled Frets.com website.

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Laurent Brondel
West Paris, Maine - USA
http://www.laurentbrondel.com/

Reed, I think what you are doing is cool.
It will always be an old guitar, but playable when you are finished.
If it was a wall hanger, you should have left it alone.
Hey, if you were restoring an old 32 Ford, that was all rusty,
wouldn't you paint that?
Good luck!

Reed, I think what you are doing is cool.
It will always be an old guitar, but playable when you are finished.
If it was a wall hanger, you should have left it alone.
Hey, if you were restoring an old 32 Ford, that was all rusty,
wouldn't you paint that?
Good luck!

Thanks for that link, Laurent.
The thing that 'struck' me was the length of time Mr Ford took to do many of the jobs- an hour or more to work the back loose, for example; 'most of a day' for another job, etc. . It's a good lesson for the impatient. I generally think that anything more than 10 minutes is a 'long' time.....

Cheers
John

That guitar was a long way from the 'rusty car' category, I think. The top finish looked pretty good in the picture, before it was scraped/sanded?.

If the OP had asked for advice, I'm pretty sure some of the pros watching this thread would have given pointers on how to do a crack repair without removing the surrounding finish.

Too late to ask now, though.

John

I agree, John.
The top should not be refinished.
The sides and back should though.
Maybe the finish on the top could be touched up on the sanded crack repair?
Aaaack, I don't know!

not wanting a cracked piece of wood ,this took forever . at least 2 hours. came out perfect .

i ordered a truss rod from lmi , the standard welded nut one , it was the lowest profile one I could find. @ 3/8 deep route. after removing the fretboard I left the iron laying on my bench to heat up the wood good. Then I ironed the neck and fretboard and clamped them down . the neck to my bench, and the fretboard to the rafters.

Since I HATE platics on acoustics . A new heel cap needed to be made too . And since im waiting on things to arrive in the mail I figured what better time than now to make it .It needed to be made before the neck could be set anyway so, here it is 1 holly heel cap.

I definately think you're on the right track!! I've worked on an old Harmony archtop, and have had decent results - even if I didn't have much "luthier" experience, just wookworking and home improvement projects with lots of tools. The back was part way off, the finish was crap, and the frets were horrid on a semi straight neck. Let me just preface that maintaining the originality and vintage scars was not high on my list.

I took the back off, and then checked internally. The top had a slight bow under the bridge, and when I tried to straighten it, both outer braces came off - with parts of the top. Ouch. So I glued the splinters back on, sanded the inside of the top, and then refitted the braces to fit. This should help with the action, as the tension of the strings caused the bridge to push the top in. I also reglued the one top crack.

The tail block and neck block/neck joint were solid, so I just reglued the back on. Of course, the shapes are completely different at this point, and I had to pry, twist and yell before it went on. There is no way I can live with the uneven edges, and there is no way to save the original finish. I sanded until everything was smooth, and then started on the neck. Several frets were already pulled up, so I moistened the fretboard and pulled the rest. The slight bow in the neck was straightened with a long 2x4 with sandpaper on it, which pulled off the plastic marker dots. I decided to replace the markers with maple to add a simplistic touch.

Once it was prepped and ready, I just got some flat/satin spray paint and started the dreadful tobacco finish. There is no way to make the cheaper laminated wood look good for a clear finish, so I had to go all the way. Orange in the middle, brown around that, and black around the edges. Then I hand sanded with fine paper and repainted the colors letting the overspray and light sanding mix the colors together. Then with a few thin coats of lacquer, it was done. The bridge and tailpiece were in good shape, but it needed a new nut and tuners.

It wasn't the best of guitars to begin with - much less quality than your Epi, but it turned out nice enough to sell and feel good about. I miss it though, as it was a good beater to have around and it was a pretty good eye catcher and conversation starter.

Good luck on yours!!

I just realized..... How do you cut the channel for the truss rod ? The neck is already tapered, how do you route a centered chanel? I'm using a dremel 231 table router with a dremel 4000 , and 3/16 routing bit . How do you account for the taper to get a centered channel? Thank you so much if anyone can wrap their head around this, my mind feels fried trying to figure this out .

also how sick is the maple in the neck shown here with the fretboard off. sick sick sick looking maple

I would make a template out of 1/2" ply and use a router with a collar and whatever size bit you need.

thanks alan!

Ahh, it's just a beat up late 30's-40's Triumph. It was never going to be museum material.

I did groan on seeing the finish sanded away from the top crack, though.

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Howard Klepper
http://www.klepperguitars.com

When all else fails, clean the shop.

Reed,

As a person who appreciates the sound of a guitar first and foremost, I think it's fantastic that you are undertaking this project to restore this gits mojo for your own personal playing pleasure. May you have the strength to ignore those who are rude and snobbish. Guitars are meant to be played.

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Bobby Masten

I don't see any rude or snobbish comments. I do see some different opinions whether the owner's approach is a good idea or not.

BTW, that guitar in my avatar is an all-original 1960 Gibson ES175D. I play it every week. The adjustable bridge on the instrument is for live playing and, like the original, is not attached to the instrument. The original bridge is safely stored away. In this manner, I have not irreversibility changed the instrument, thereby maintaining its value, and improved its utility, thereby maximizing its usefulness to me as a player. Voila.

It seems to me that the owner could have the instrument restored to perfect playability without making so many unnecessary alterations. That is my opinion.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Steve,
you are correct in that there is a difference of opinion on some of the posters as to method. Poor choice of words on my part to use "rude and snobbish". I apologize. Too often there are members of this and other forums who are less than helpful unless one is an established professional or a very persistent and active amateur member. When some of the most knowledgeable and talented builders skip over newer builders questions completely and post many times in an established members thread instead, or reply with "do a search for that information" it irritates me. I'm here to network with and learn from those that are the experts so that I may do the best possible job I can. Many have shown class and a willingness to answer my and others "dumb" questions. To those of you in that category, a sincere thank you. Again I apologize if my wording offended you or anyone else.

I'm sure Reed was aware that he could have paid a professional to have done a more historic and less invasive repair. He's chosen to tackle it himself whether it is for economic or just personal satisfaction reasons. I applaud him for taking on a project that requires a significant amount of patience and skill as I wouldn't even attempt what he's doing at this stage in my knowledge level.

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Bobby Masten