Fixing a 1969s-vintage Goya classical

[MaineGeezer]

Due to ever-encroaching Parkinson's disease I haven't done any building for a while now. The other day though a woman asked me if I could recommend somebody to repair her 1960s Goya classical. I'd guess that in its prime on a good day it's at best a $300 - $400 guitar, and that would cover maybe half the cost of repairing it, so it was definitely in the "not worth fixing" category if one had a competent repair person do the job. What she needed was a happy idiot willing to try fixing it just for the perceived fun of it. And I knew just such a person....

It's not quite as bad as I''m making it sound. Before Parkinson's took over my life I did build six pretty nice guitars as well as some other things. The woman doesn't want the guitar back, regardless. She just wants to get rid of it, but she would like to give it to somebody who would like a guitar (e.g. Guitars for Vets, or similar). If I totally botch the repair, I'm to feel free to chuck it in the fireplace with no feeling of guilt.

So it''s a guitar I can practice on -- something several people here have recommended as a great way to practice the skills required to build guitars.

For starters, her''s a photo of the tail end. Sides are split and coming loose from the tail block, the tail block loose and not attached to much. Not seen: a crack in the top, two missing back braces and the third one loose.
More to come.

[MaineGeezer]

I consulted my friend Carter, a professional luthier, to get his thoughts on the best way to proceed. Considering all the problems, he suggested taking off the back would make a lot of the much easier as well as permitting better clamping (replacing the missing back braces, for instance) .Of course, that would mean I'd eventually have to to put the back on again+, but that was in the future, sometime, and I'd removed and reinstalled s guitar back when i
changed my Harmony Soverign from ladder bracing to X bracing, so I had EXPERIENCE! At least a little.

Carter also encouraged me to try to save the binding, if possible, to preserve as much of the original as possible; the provenance, you know. I tried, using my gramil to try to peel off the binding. It worked up to a point, but not well enough to salvage the binding. Maybe Carter could have done it, but not me. There is nothing special about the binding, anyway, except its originality. It's ' just generic plastic binding. If I were doing it again, I''d cut it off with
q routet

Here are some more pictures. Their order may not match the order of my descriptions, but it shouldn't be too difficult to sort them out.

Refer to the photo of the guitar with the back removed. You will also notice that the tail block has been removed. It came out easily and if you look at where it was you can see why, There is no sign of glue on the right side, and only partial evidence of glue on the left. Examining the back where the braces were, there is a similar lack of glue. No wonder the braces fell off and the sides started flapping!

There is also a pioct8ire of the crack in the top. In the picture of the opened-up guitar, you can see a repair cleat glued across it. i did that fairly early on, before I'd realized it was not going to be a simple repair job.

[MaineGeezer]

Gluing on a back brace. I've sanded a 15' radius into it. The top is still square, to make it easier to put the go-bars (fiberglass driveway markers) on it. It's set up on my work bench, and the top of the "go-bar deck" is the basement ceiling.
Tomorrow I'll round the top and taper the ends, then glue on the next one.

[Kevin Sjostrand]

This is a crazy cool repair attempt your doing. I bet you make her a player again.
Sorry about the Parkinsons, I didn't know you had that struggle. I believe Diane has been dealing with it too.

Looking forward to seeing you bring this guitar back to life.

Kevin

[MaineGeezer]

The back with the new braces glued on and shaped, and the one remaining original brace reattached. The photo may ;look as though the braces aren't parallel to each other and perpendicular to the top''s centerline, but they are.

Next is a more robust tail block that's properly glued to the sides, and a better cleat across the crack in the top.

[MaineGeezer]

...and here is the new tail block, reinforced with a couple strips of carbon fiber epoxied into grooves on the sides. I used a piece of Spanish cedar 1) because I had it and 2) I thought something lightweight would be appropriate for a classical guitar. This afternoon I sorted out the splits and separations at the end of the guitar and got them fixed. Tomorrow I'll see about installing the new block.

Also pictured below is the side of the guitar case it a came in. I think at one time it was a nice case, but it is USED in a big way. Anybody who aspires to be seen as a Ramblin' Man (tm) who's traveled that hot dusty road, guitar in hand, would trade his timeshare in Vail for this case. But I digress.

As you can see, the side is bashed in. I trimmed off the broken ends,which were just a mass of splintered wood. What yous see in the gap is the back of the inside lining. I'll need to fill the gap with something so it's reasonably solid and strong. That project will be after I finish fixing the guitar.

[MaineGeezer]

Thoughts on patching the case:

I was thinking I could bend a thin piece of hickory to conform to the curve of the case, slip it into the hole in
the case, secure it well, and that would make a good base to build up to fill the hole. I even had some 1/8" hickory.
Unfortunately, it didn't bend worth a hoot. There was too much springback. So on to Plan B.

Regular readers may recall the case I built for my 00 project. I made the curves in the case by stacking up shapes cut out with my CNC. The end product was pretty heavy. For a single patch though, it may be reasonable. I hope.

Something like this:

[MaineGeezer]

I'm letting the case repair percolate for a bit while I go back to the guitar. It's at the point where I can start thinking about replacing the back. As expected, the sides sprung a bit when the back came off and doesn't quite line up with the sides anymore. I decided I'd try BEJ's idea viewtopic.php?f=4&t=10142
to get the sides to the proper shape. As you can see, my setup was more "rustic" than his, being a single plywood ring propped up on some random blocks. All i need it for is a one-time operation, and all it needs to do is work once.
It also serves as"proof of concept." I need to make more wedges, but my initial trial suggests it is going to work extremely well.
The new tail block seems to have made the end pull in a bit, so I made a jack arrangement to push it out. Those of you who are thinking, "That ain't gonna come out through the sound hole!"...I have a plan for that.

DSC05492.JPG

DSC05493.JPG

[Kevin Sjostrand]

Sabre saw stuck into the soundless to cut that stick in two? 🤓

[MaineGeezer]

The saber saw is certainly the "if all else fails" option. I pre-cut it it though, and put it back together with short dowels between the pieces.

The original label was incredibly fragile and brittle. It was disintegrating into dust if I touched it, so I made a replacement.

DSC05494.JPG

GOYA LABEL.jpg

And it was time to try gluing the back on. I wedged the sides as best I could to make them conform to the back. If I was firing on all cylinders I would have taken more time making the plywood ring and arranging the wedges....but I'm not, and I didn't.

My clamping also leaves a lot to be desired. j pre-fitted it pretty carefully though, and it looked as though there was good contact all the way around.