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Harmony Sovereign Delux Jumbo - broken truss rod


Beemer2

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My Harmony H1265 (1967) has a broken "Torque-lok reinforcement bar". I note from http://www.vintageguitars.org.uk/adDetails/122 that this is a dual bar truss rod.

 

Does anyone have a photograph of this rod either on its own, or seen with the fingerboard removed?

 

I'm hoping that I can get it welded but perhaps I will need to make one.

 

regards,

 

Ian

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EG,

 

Thanks for you reply. I have added a photo of the one-piece solid mahogany back as are the sides.

 

As I am in the UK perhaps someone could point me in the direction of where I might be able to buy a Torque-Lok rod for a Harmony H1260 which is more common than my H1265. I guess that they will have the same rod type and length.

 

regards,

 

Ian

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One thing about that Stewmac truss rod:

 

It has a reputation among luthiers as being a bit delicate in the threads and easily strips under stress.

 

Personally if it was a good fit/replacement and you could slide out the old one easily to replace it, I would use it...but maybe be careful how hard you turn it and be sure to put some lubricant like automotive lube on the treads prior to inserting it.

 

 

BTW I love jumbo Harmony Sovereign guitars. I own 6 of them

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While Harmony trus rods are single action, they look lke they function pretty much like that Stew-Mac rod. A long flat bottomed "U" shape. One end lodges against the inside of the channel, the other is longer and threaded for the nut. You tighten the nut, the other bar bends outward to warp the neck.

 

It's a unique system but because of the double rod, not very robust compared to a single rod system. I've broken one myself (Aaarrrgh!!!).

 

I'm a big 1260 fan myself, and have two. Hope you get yours fixed. The Stew-Mac might be the ticket, or you could opt for a more traditional design.

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Dang! I love those 1260's, had one in the late 1960's and learned to fingerpick on it...always wanted another one. I would commit a crime for the op's deluxe Sovereign, there's one on ebay right now with a BIN price of around $1200.

 

Can a guy find a decent one with a reasonably low string height anymore?

 

Unfortunately, I'm not into neck re-sets.

 

I'm soon going shopping for a Taylor, but I could almost be temporarilly swayed away by a very good vintage Sovereign Jumbo.

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boxorox,

 

I have managed to get the collar underneath he truss rod nut extracted. I expected it to be welded to the rod. Presumably I need to remove the nut to get the outer section removed?

 

Looking at the end of the outer section it looks a mess! It does not look like a tube end more like the end of a cycle brake cable "outer" if you know what I mean.

 

Obviously I am hoping that I do not have to steam off the fingerboard. In your opinion should I be able to extract the assembly after taking off the nut?

 

When I examined the broken part it is about 1" long and covered in rust despite the guitar never being stored in high humidity.

 

I take this opportunity of asking you to confirm a Sovereign spec dimension. I understand that the string height at the seventeen fret should be 1/4". This seems excesssive but I would like your opinion so that I can consider whether to tackle a neck reset?

 

regards,

 

Ian

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I do all my own neck resets. I buy Harmony Sovereign jumbos on Ebay and I love it when the action is unplayable. I get to buy them cheap and then I fix them at my shop.

If your Harmony needs a neck reset, don't pull off the fretboard. You might want to steam the neck off and then you'll have access to the truss rod from the other end so you might be able to remove it easier.

 

 

 

Personally I'm more of a fan of the more common 1260 Harmony jumbos over the "top-of-the-line" moustache bridge version. While the pin bridge is probably a bit easier to adjust when the action gets low, it has a larger footprint and tends to sound brighter. I'm also not a fan of adjustable saddles because they sometimes act as a shock absorber. Only one of my 6 Harmony

jumbos is that type and I replaced the adjustable saddle with a bone saddle and it helped the sound a lot. Another problem I notice with those models is that they use spruce as a bridge plate...which is fine with a pinless bridge...but can easily get chewed up from string ball ends because it's a softwood. I added a rosewood plate on mine to help this situation with no ill effects.

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Don't think I have ever heard of or seen a one piece back. Must have been one helluva tree!

 

 

 

It's a huge irony. I think Harmony used them to save on costs.

 

Back in the 1950's and 60's, huge quartersawn slabs of Honduran mahogany were plentiful, and I think Harmony decided it would be more cost efficient to just use these 16" wide single pieces instead of dealing with the extra work involved bookmatching two piece backs: joining them seamlessly, keeping track of matched sets, spending money on center strip marquetry and the spruce reinforcement, cutting around the spruce reinforcement to accomodate the back braces....

 

The result is the use of materials impossible to obtain today: not only is everything HONDURAN mahogany(not some substitute species used these days like Asian or African, Sapele whatever) ...but these "discount" guitars used a single slab 16" across. (Btw the neck is also one-piece Honduran mahogany...not Asian or African, no headstock "ears" or neck heel built up from pieces, no scarf joint)

 

You can't find that on guitars costing less than a grand today.

 

The spruce is also "red spruce" that's extremely rare these days in guitar building other than custom shops and private luthiers. Acid rain has devastated the red spruce industry in the eastern USA. It's all Sitka and Engleman these days. All of the prized pre-war Martins used red spruce.

(They're made from sitka today)

 

And the Brazilian rosewood fingerboard and bridge? Forget about finding that anywhere except custom shops and private luthiers.

 

 

It's so ridiculous that these days I buy up trashed Harmony Sovereigns for the materials alone. I can't imagine what a single 16" wide quartersawn slab of Honduran mahogany would cost me from a lumber supplier if I could actualy find one. $150? $200? How about a one piece mahogany neck? Stew mac sells them for over $100. Toss in a 50 year old aged red spruce top...I dunno...$100? And a Brazilian fretboard and bridge maybe another $40-$50.

 

All of these parts are AAA quality too. No pin knots, worm holes, color defects. Usually if you find stuff today and it's the right size and wood species...it's the dregs in terms of quality. Slab cut instead of quartersawn,

warped, pin knots etc....

 

So do I think buying one where the neck is about to fall off for $150-$200 is a good idea?

 

Like I said, I own 6 of them. :lol:

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Dovetail. The neck is one piece mahogany and I usually remove them in the typical way. Pull the 15th fret. Inject steam from a cappuccino machine in there.

 

The neck block is usually some lighter wood like poplar or maple I have to say.... not mahogany. The glue has ALWAYS been hide glue in every one of these I've opened up. I've probably worked on 15 Harmony acoustics this way.

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In all things technical, I defer to Guitarcapo, High Priest of Harmony.

 

My experiance was with one of their bolt neck mandos. To start, I broke the truss rod. After that, I did everything as wrong as could be, finally having to get a new neck made. It was a very educational experiance. Learning from mistakes... You get a dunce cap and a diploma.

 

17th fret is a funny place to measure action, as it's attached to the top and not telling us much about the whole geometry of the neck. But I measured a couple guitars, and I'm getting about 3/8ths, and that's pretty close.

 

If you decide on a neck reset anyway, deal with the truss rod issue then. You'll probably have more options of approach if it's apart.

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I HAVE removed fingerboards on occasion on Harmony guitars...but usually it's because the fingerboard was the cheap dyed pearwood kind without a radius to the fretboard...and I figured that if I was going to do a refret anyway in the overhaul, I might as well upgrade the fingerboard to radiused ebony in the bargain. I have a mahogany Harmony tenor guitar like that.

 

Pearwood chips out like mad being refret...and since it's dyed black it makes for an ugly refret. And it's not like originality is really valued on these Harmonys.

 

It's a pretty simple process: I usually use an old clothes iron set to the highest setting. I just lay it flat on top of the fingerboard, frets and all.

You can start on either end. Probably removing the nut and starting on that end is better. You just slip a knife under there and work it up the neck. The heat works pretty easy on the glue.

 

I don't recommend this if you are thinking about reusing the board. The heat can really warp a fingerboard and it's usually not the same after you've removed it. There'd be a lot of work getting the board usable again. And Brazilian rosewood fretboards that are as nice as you see on old Harmonys are hard to find cheap these days.

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  • 7 months later...
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Hey Beemer, did you fix the truss rod in your 1265?


Guitar Capo has told you most of the story, Frank Ford's site has the best procedure for removing a broken rod, and I can help you if you need truss rod parts.

 

 

As I only have one guitar I have been delaying the neck reset and Torq-Lok repair. This week I'm ordering a new Faith 000 12 fret so once I have it I can fix the Harmony at a more leisurely pace. Do you have original Tork-Loq rods available or are they reclaimed or welded?

 

Beemer2

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Hi Beemer,

 

Here's FF's thread, if you haven't seen it already:

 

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Luthier/Technique/TrussRods/BrokenRods/HarmonyRod/harmonyrod.html

 

I'm not a pro, just got a huge passion for 1260's, and I've followed Mr Ford's advice successfully a couple of times. I have one 1260 that had NO rod in the hole, so I set about making one with the help of my machinist friend. I made a few extra mushroom washers ( which are seldom missing) and quite a few extra nuts (which is the part most people need to repair a broken rod).

 

If you are going to do a neck reset, which is required of all these Harmony jumbos at this stage of their lives, you will find that Guitar Capo is right. Soon as the neck is off, there's the end of the truss rod sitting in its slot. All you have to do is push it and it will emerge with ease from the headstock end. Doesn't matter how rusty it is, just fine sand the rust. Recut the threads 8-32 and reshape the live end like Frank says, and all you need is the nut to get the rod back into business.

 

There is no difference in effect between a shortened rod and a full length rod. In fact, Harmony cut enough thread into the original that it seems they were designed to be repaired at least once without cutting new threads.

 

So once you have the rod in hand, contact me and I will send you a brass nut, just like the one FF describes. Like I say, I'm not a pro and I'm not in the business. So far I've just given these nuts away whenever I believe a Harmony guitar is going to be saved.

 

Good luck with your neck reset. I did my first on an ebay beater, and I'd recommend you follow that route. Even if it's a cheap Stella or H165. That way you get to experience the sinking feeling of having overset the neck, but the apple of your eye remains intact, ready to benefit from the harsh lesson you've learned.

 

Sea Champ

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So once you have the rod in hand, contact me and I will send you a brass nut, just like the one FF describes. Like I say, I'm not a pro and I'm not in the business. So far I've just given these nuts away whenever I believe a Harmony guitar is going to be saved.


Sea Champ

 

 

That's a nice gesture. I now have my Faith 000 12 fret bought today so I will soon start to get the neck off the H1265.

 

Beemer2

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  • 3 weeks later...
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A broken "dual truss-rod" in a Harmony guitar is no problem, and it is completely unnecessary to remove the fretboard.

If you haven't already found a solution to your problem, do as follows :

Grab the nut with a longnosed pliers and simply pull the steel-rod out of the neck. The threaded part has a lathed "pusher", the mission of which is to compress the remaining part, take care to get this out too. If you turn the guitar with the headstock dowords towards the floor and beat the neck with your hand I am sure the remaining part will fall out of the neck.

The usual reason why these rods break is a poor hard-soldering (soldering with brass). It broke in my H49 too by the first attempt, and I felt broken too - -

Get it re-soldered at a workshop - - - bycycle-workshops normaly undertake such operations. It might be necessary to grind or file the solder if it gets too clumsy.

After repair and assembly, just insert the rod again - the threaded part against the rear of the neck, and you will be able to adjust the neck again !!

The principle in this truss rod : Having it out of the neck and trying to tension the nut it will act like a stringed arch. Meanwhile, when inserted it will have no space to do so, and instead it will curve front-to-back and straighten your neck. Simple, but very effecient, and it does not comress the neck lengthwise !!

The very best Regards

Henning

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  • 11 months later...
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The Harmony dual truss rod is the easiest truss rod to repair. You need not by a new one that might not fit into the channel !!

I guess it is broken in the welding at the body end. It is not unusual - -

Remove nut cover.

Grab the nut by a set of long nosed pliers and pull the threaded part out, it is the one nearest the rear of the neck. Turn the guitar body up/neck down and tap on the neck with your hand. The rest of the rod may come out. If not, try with pliers, it ought to be possible to pull the last rod out without great effort.

Go to a workshop that can undertake brass soldering and have the rod repaired. Get soldered approx. 1" long for durability.

When assembled, lubricate the nut, reinsert the truss rod, and voila, you can adjust your guitar for comfortable playing again.

Good luck

Henning Hojen

Denmark

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