Question for Freeman

[Phil O'Keefe]

Suppose you have a neck that has broken at the headstock joint, and the headstock joint is a finger joint (think "Baby Taylor") - BUT (and here's the curve ball), the joint isn't broken very much, so even with a bit of pressure on it, it doesn't "open up" very far. How the heck do you get sufficient glue into things to repair it?

 

 

 

[Freeman Keller]

How the heck did a finger joint break?

 

Anyway, I'm assuming the break is not just the joint but wood in the area of the joint. I'm also assuming that the head plate is still holding things together. Take the tuners off and try to work a couple of small wooden wedges into the joint to force it open (a little, you don't want to continue breaking it of course). Figure out some way to support the guitar vertically - put the headstock on a bench and the body against a wall behind the bench or something. Put a little bit of glue, I would use Titebond original (red bottle) at the opening and work it in with something long and thin - I keep the cut off ends of low E strings to be poky tools. The combination of gravity and the wire should get the glue down inside the crack. Clamp it with a caul and waxed paper on both sides, clean the squeeze out with a damp cloth.

 

This should work assuming (1) the wood isn't badly splintered, in which case it won't pull together with the clamps, or (2) the fracture isn't the old glue line, in which case the new glue won't bond to the old and you need to take it completely apart and clean it up.

 

Here is a picture where I've clamped the neck to the work bench and put another clamp on the headstock to pull the crack open (gently) and working the glue in with a poky tool. Unlike hide glue, Titebond has enough open working time to let you really poke around in there.

 

 

If I'm not visualizing this a picture would help.