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Hey all, I'm working on my first build and committed what feels like a catastrophic error. I was dry fitting my top to glue to the sides, and I cracked it at the bottom and top of the soundboard. I think my go bar rods put too much force on one side with the cauls I was using. I'm going to replace my go bars with the ones from John's store and try his method in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8qAvQ5ExSE. It looks like I can buy a 1" foam floor pad and cut to size. Though, I'm not sure where to get a halo, I'll address that after this.

I am a brand new builder with no woodworking experience, so it's all new to me. I've been kicking myself about this for the last few days. I guess it's a good learning experience if nothing else.

With a light behind, you can clearly see the crack (see attached photos). Is this recoverable? What would you recommend doing if so?

That seems to be split at the joint. Hard to tell in the photo If it were me and I could close the opening without it being seen then I’d glue it closed. If it could be seen, then I’d replace the top, they aren’t terribly expensive. To glue, I’d use stretchy tape and tite bond 1.

It looks to me like the centre glue joint was not well done in the first place, leaving cracks. Having made lots of mistakes myself, and realizing in the end it is often best to backtrack or start again, I would follow John's suggestion and start a new top. But take care to plane the edges perfectly for a tight seam. I hold the two top pieces up against a window, until I can't see any light at all between them along the seam, and then glue it. It's tricky. You may be able to salvage the original top for a future project, if you put it aside until you gain some more skills. You may be able to unglue the bracing (with heat), or chisel it off, then take the top apart, and re-plane the centre seam more carefully. You will end up with a slightly visible join in two places on the rosette, but might be acceptable. It's frustrating, but not a disaster - you'll get there. Bruce W.

Well! That's a bummer. It reminds me of the time I cracked one of the sides of a $500 back and sides set. Point being, we've all done something similar, if not worse. It goes with the territory, so don't flog yourself too badly. Get yourself a big box, mark it "Learning Experiences," and carefully place the the top therein. You'll find a use for it, someday. Then get a new top and try again.
You could try to fix this one, but I'll concur with Stray Feathers and JRead--in the end, starting over will be the cleanest way.
If you want to try gluing it without fussing with it too much, get some water-thin CA glue, wick it into the crack, and immediately clamp. You'd probably want to have the clamps in place and loosened just enough to let the crack open up while you wick in the CA glue. That might work. CA glue tends to stain spruce though, which, depending the extent of the staining, may make the repair rather obvious. That problem might be lessened by sealing the top and bottom with a thin coat of shellac, being careful not to get the shellac on the crack surfaces you want to glue.
If you really get motivated to "fix it right" and separate the two halves of the top so you can sand or plane the edges to get a really tight joint, you'll no longer have a round sound hole.
Starting over will be easier.

I would chalk this one up to a learning experience and make a new top if it were me. You could try ca glue, but as previously stated, it will probably wick into the spruce and stain it. Another alternative I was thinking might work is to try and force the crack to open more and work tite bond into it and try and clamp it together. This, however, might be difficult as the braces will be fighting you and keeping you from opening the crack. Also….. I highly suspect the crack was the result of a poor glue joint in the first place, most likely because the two pieces weren’t perfectly flat and matched at the joint. In this case, trying to re glue it won’t work.