Martin 1947 000-28 FINISHED
Posted: Tue May 02, 2017 12:25 pm
This lovely lady is owned by a gentleman in Georgia. He's entrusted me with quite a few old Martins.
This girl isn't too bad. Someone had installed 2 plastic doodads along the shoulders, which looked terrible. Of course, the glue ate into the nitro finish. The heat from shipping, caused them to fall off. LOL She also has a crack in the left side, lower bout. The neck needs reset, the fingerboard ss cracked, chipped, and the inlay was partially missing, so she'll get a new fingerboard. The bridge had a chip out of it about 15 x 12mm. The chip was in the bottom of the case, so I was lucky. Of course, the nitro finish is a mess. The guitar is a mass of scratches and gouges. The top had very little nitro left.
My game plan is to pull the neck, address the cracks, then address the finish and tuners. Lastly, I'll make another ebony fretboard. She's compression fretted, so this will be my first journey into this type of neck relief.
This one will be fun to work on.
I've already pulled the neck. I also took off the wood needed to reset the angle; I can simply reinstall it when I'm ready, so the reset is "done" sans the gluing.
I ended up taking off what little was left of the finish on the top. Most was missing and that area on top had to be cleaned. I had to address the dirt that had gotten into the top crack, as well as the dents.
I stabilized the crack in the spruce by using Titebond from the inside of the guitar. CA glue stains spruce and I need to finish the top. I used a suction cup to pull the glue into the crack from the bottom. I also installed a thin cleat made of adi, using rare earth magnets to clamp the cleat.
The side crack is about 3" long. I made a piece of veneer about 1/2" x 4" on my sanding station and bandsaw. I used CA glue along the crack to stabilize it. I installed the veneer, so that the grain line runs perpendicular to the sides of the guitar, using Rare Earth magnets to hold it in place while curing.
The tuners are original, but they're rusted; they will need to be cleaned up a bit.
Isabella was my task driver for the day.
This girl isn't too bad. Someone had installed 2 plastic doodads along the shoulders, which looked terrible. Of course, the glue ate into the nitro finish. The heat from shipping, caused them to fall off. LOL She also has a crack in the left side, lower bout. The neck needs reset, the fingerboard ss cracked, chipped, and the inlay was partially missing, so she'll get a new fingerboard. The bridge had a chip out of it about 15 x 12mm. The chip was in the bottom of the case, so I was lucky. Of course, the nitro finish is a mess. The guitar is a mass of scratches and gouges. The top had very little nitro left.
My game plan is to pull the neck, address the cracks, then address the finish and tuners. Lastly, I'll make another ebony fretboard. She's compression fretted, so this will be my first journey into this type of neck relief.
This one will be fun to work on.
I've already pulled the neck. I also took off the wood needed to reset the angle; I can simply reinstall it when I'm ready, so the reset is "done" sans the gluing.
I ended up taking off what little was left of the finish on the top. Most was missing and that area on top had to be cleaned. I had to address the dirt that had gotten into the top crack, as well as the dents.
I stabilized the crack in the spruce by using Titebond from the inside of the guitar. CA glue stains spruce and I need to finish the top. I used a suction cup to pull the glue into the crack from the bottom. I also installed a thin cleat made of adi, using rare earth magnets to clamp the cleat.
The side crack is about 3" long. I made a piece of veneer about 1/2" x 4" on my sanding station and bandsaw. I used CA glue along the crack to stabilize it. I installed the veneer, so that the grain line runs perpendicular to the sides of the guitar, using Rare Earth magnets to hold it in place while curing.
The tuners are original, but they're rusted; they will need to be cleaned up a bit.
Isabella was my task driver for the day.