A Headstock Repair

 
The headstock of this Gibson Les Paul Special was broken when the case fell over on its side.  Sometimes, those things happen.  The customer did the right thing by calling me right away after it had happened.  I  told him to cut the strings right away and close the case as soon as they were cut.  In order to restore it to perfection, I had to have every paint chip and splinter.

As you can see by these first pictures, most of the edges are intact.  There are no missing pieces of wood, or paint chips.  Chances are very good, this may go back together very nicely.  The success depends on how well this crack can be put back together with proper glue and clamping.

This picture shows that the crack did not go throught the truss rod adjusting cavity.
 

Getting the crack to go exactly back together is of great importance to a successful repair.  Not all cracked headstocks go back together as they came apart.  Sometimes you have to muscle them back together into alighnment as you clamp them together.  This can be very difficult at times getting the edges to line up perfectly for the entire length of the sepration around the headstock.

Here, you can see a little of the paint was lost from the left center of the crack during the clamping process.  That will be fixed later with an artist's brush, and an air brush.

The clamps have now been removed, the glue cleaned from the neck, the missing color touched up with an artist's brush, and the crack area color matched with an air brush.

This picture shows the color is now matched to the surrounding area of the crack.  The crack's impression in the finish will be filled in with clear paint.  Those little white specks in the impression is light from the flash of the camera reflected back to the lens.

The impression has now been filled in, and the surrounding area has been sprayed with clear finish.

A few heavy top coats of clear finish has now been applied to blend in the over all appearance to the rest of the neck and headstock.  The masking tape will be removed from the binding, the finish edge sanded, and polished.

A less than perfect polished finish was used with some added slight finish imperfections to hide the fact that this headstock had been broken in the first place.  In comparison to the rest of the guitar, a perfect repair would draw attention to the area of the headstock for close inspection.

It takes expertise to piece things back together.  With all the saved pieces, we can restore it perfectly,  and with a little expert touch up, it will look like it never happened.

============================================================
 

Subject:
            Re: Repairing a Cracked Neck
       Date:
            Thu, 2 Sep 2004 14:21:21 -0400
       From:
            "David O'H" <.>
 Newsgroups:
            rec.music.makers.builders, alt.guitar, alt.guitar.amps
  References:
            1 , 2 , 3 , 4
 
 
 

"Rich Koerner" <richk@timeelect.com> wrote in message
news:41361889.6D9F1965@timeelect.com...

> The last thing, is how good that spray gun artist can make all evidence of
it, disappear.
>
> For example, http://timeelect.com/headstock.htm

All I can say is ...wow.

I used to do repairs professionally in a previous life, and seeing the end
result here -- artist is not too strong a word for the person (persons? Was
the same person wielding the spray gun that did the other repair work?) who
sorted out this headstock break.

Lovely work, Rich.

Dave O'Heare
oheareATmagmaDOTca
 

============================================================
 

Subject:
             Re: Repairing a Cracked Neck
        Date:
             Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:57:39 GMT
       From:
             "Jim McShane" <jimmcshane@prodigy.net>
 Organization:
             SBC http://yahoo.sbc.com
 Newsgroups:
             rec.music.makers.builders, alt.guitar, alt.guitar.amps
  References:
             1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5
 
 
 

Rich Koerner wrote...

 > The last thing, is how good that spray gun artist
> can make all evidence of it, disappear.

> For example, http://timeelect.com/headstock.htm

Rich, that's a remarkable piece of work. I'm in awe
of the skill you have. Wow, gorgeous job!

Jim McShane
Need Tubes? Got a H-K Citation (Pre) Amp?
Check http://pages.prodigy.net/jimmcshane
Repro knobs for Citation gear in stock!