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Hey everyone, I had a question on how to approach this bridge reglue. It's from a 1940's Kay type guitar, I removed the bridge without issue, and did some surfacing of the underside of it, but there's a problem. The bridge is missing material on the outer edges and I don't think I can remove much more material without compromising the overall shape and structure of it. I was wondering if you had suggestions on how to approach this? I wa…

Hello! A client of mine have given up on the idea that he'll make good use of this Gibson and Fender stash. He willing to entertain separating items and is open to offers. No idea how to value this lot... Please call or text 1-765-729-5282 if you have questions or offers. Located in between Indianapolis and Fort Wayne Indiana. As I understand it, getting NOS Gibson headstock veneers can cost and arm and a leg these days... The headstock ve…

First time making purfling to match a repair. Problem: couldn’t get it to bend without delaminating and cracking. Veneer is 6 plies using 4 of SMs 0.023” and 2 maple at 0.025” cut to 1 1?2 inches wide. Glue up with Titebond Veneer glue, final stack at 0.140” thick. Let it dry 2 days, cut a few 0.090” strips, then used some super soft just at the waist and despite going very slowly the strip skewed, delaminated and started to break plies. W…

Greetings and thanks in advance for your help. I live in one of the most inhospitable places in the world for wood storage (Mojave Desert CA) and later this year will be moving to another more inhospitable place (Sonoran Desert, Buckeye AZ). The realative humidity is currently 16% and that will drop when summer comes. I'm attempting to collect and store wood for future builds and today I spent some time wrapping all of it in seran…

I had a bridge replacement in which the top surface (laminate) had been badly damaged during a prior repair. The first picture shows the extent of the tear out, including one large area and many smaller defects in the top layer. The surface was cleaned of all the old glue and primed with dilute hide glue. A piece of poplar veneer was glued in the largest defect and a hot slurry of hide glue and fine poplar dust was spread across the res…

The COE reviewed this bridge disaster in January, a Tanglewood acoustic given to me that had the bridge ripped off as well as some of the underlying top, and an attempted repair with spruce veneer (COE video link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlpOIWQrAlw&t=2685s). The general opinion was to install a bigger bridge plate. However, once I removed the existing bridge plate, I found that the underlying repair had not been fully done,…

Hello fellow looths! I recently had a customer come in with a '71 Fender neck that is a fusion of the 60s and 70s style. It has a veneer fretboard, no skunkstripe, 4 screwholes, 70s style tuners, 70s headstock logo, and it seems like it has a poly finish on the back of the neck, and nitro (with cracking) on the front of the headstock. Can anyone tell me if this combination is possible or could it be fake? Another thing is, even without th…

Hi -- I'm building a Thinline Tele and accidentally over-planed the mahogany neck blank. It is now 18.7 mm thick on avg and my rosewood fingerboard is 5.95 mm -- for a total of 24.65 mm instead of the recommended 25.4 mm (1 inch). So the total thickness will be thinner by 0.75 mm or so. 1. Am I still within practical tolerance and therefore should just go ahead with the build as normal? 2. Should I try gluing a 0.55 mm maple veneer I hav…

I have a Gibson Chet Atkins in the shop with a nasty headstock re-break. The headstock was broken off previously and repaired (at another shop). The repair to the front of the headstock has held, but the main break opened back up along the same line. Since the headstock is hanging on by the headstock veneer I can't really open up the crack enough to clean out the old glue residue that's deep inside the break. I'm looking for advise as t…

Hey there! Newbie here. I thought it would have been cool to show just a pic of a current work I'm doing for a customer. Basically this was a brand new bass, never played, cause it was delivered with non uniform fretboard, a broken truss rod and warped neck. I had to remove the old fretboard (ebony), reinstall a new double action truss-rod, compensate the eight of the fretboard with 2 layer of black veneer (since this is a neck-through t…

Hi gang! I have a 1968 Harmony Sovereign H1260 I'm almost done repairing/ restoring. The headstock had a nasty break and an even worse repair (nails, screws, and bondo were involved). For esthetic and structural support I put an ebony headstock veneer on. Does anyone know how to get or make a replacement graphic for the headstock?

I recently picked up a gutted first year Country Gent with a headstock break. It had been previously "repaired" with mystery glue, nails, bondo and believe it or not.....staples. I am likely out of my depth here but I want to bring this little bit of history back to life. I scraped off the bondo and that is when I found the staples hiding underneath. I removed the staples and gave the headstock some gentle pressure and found that the ga…

I acquired this old single cut JR around 6 years ago. Was aware of the previous breaks and repairs, wasn't a particular concern as I acquired through trade. The headstock broke a couple years ago with a very small sideways tumble ( in its case). I used some clamps and rubber tubing to glue the break back together. Decided to scrape back the finish and see at the previous repairs. I see epoxy, carribbean walnut splines, carbon fiber 1/8…

Any thoughts on disguising this sand-through? It’s got a black veneer under the wood veneer that is showing through a little. Part of it will be covered by the tuner bushing. Clear finish.

Two pieces of maple, each of which were measured beforehand and then cut up and epoxied back together to keep things as consistent as possible. Even the orientation of the grain was the same to avoid any impact of vertical vs horizontal grain lines. The plain maple had one layer of 300gsm 12k unidirectional carbon fibre between each piece, the flame maple had two per lamination, which may be why it sees a smaller gain afterwards? Lots m…

Hey guys, Trying my first bound headstocks and need some advice on how to approach it once I get to my nut area. I usually shape the headstock with a template and leave about 1/8” before the nut untouched so don’t roll the shape I to the nut slot area(aka a bad time). How do you all approach this process and specifically the nut slot area. I’ve attached some photos so you can see what I mean. Veneer on headstock is about 2mm. Neck is lig…

Hi guys, I thinned my headstock on my neck blank too much. Right now it is at about 9mm. It should be around 12mm. Can anyone give me advice on how to make sure it won’t break? I was thinking about doing a Maple and Ebony veneer on the top and the bottom. What would be enough thickness?