During the last week I fixed the red lacquer on the back and sides of the guitar that was ruined when I steamed the neck loose. It came out pretty good, but you can definitely see the scar. Pictures are below.

Speaking of scars… I decided my lacquer repair boo boo needs a band aid to make it better.

I went to Michael’s and bought some water slide paper that you can print on with an ink jet printer. It makes the little decals that you soak in water and slide on the object.

The base decal material is clear and common house printers are meant to print on material with a white background. My decal didn’t look good on a sweet red guitar.

Amazon to the rescue! I bought some more waterslide paper that has a solid white background instead of clear and started over. The result looks great!

The band aid is a fun reminder of the path to get here.

Next step is 6-8 coats of clear on top of the band aid decal.

I re-glued the neck last weekend and it seemed to be a success! After I unclamped the guitar, I strung out up and let it sit for a few days. The wood has spent most of its life being a tree, then it became guitar parts. I hear it’s important to let it acclimate to being a guitar. It’s been strung up for a few days now so the neck should be more set.

I adjusted the truss rod to put in a little relief (about 0.007″ at the 8th fret) and set the string height to about 4/64 to 5/64. I get a little bit of fret buzz at the 22nd fret, but that’s ok for now. All I really wanted to see is if it would set up nice and it will be fine and dandy!

Next step is to fix the paint job this weekend and then do the wiring.

Yay!

Here are some photos.

The neck is glued in (again)! Hopefully this is the last time anyone ever see the pieces apart! 🤞

This time I used “hide glue” for the joint. This type of glue is traditional for making musical instruments, especially on parts that need to be repaired in the future. It is plenty strong, and also can be taken apart fairly easy using heat. If o used hide glue the first time, I prolly wouldn’t have messed up the lacquer trying to get it apart.

Hide glue is made of animal leftovers like skins and hoofs (think of the old cartoons where they sent the horse to the glue factory). It comes to me in a crystal form that needs to be mixed with water to re-hydrate it. Before use, it needs to be heated to around 140°F before applying. You need to act quick when applying it and clamping the wood because once it cools down a bit, it’s too late and you have to start over. This page has a lot of info about hide glue.

The gluing went well I think and the guitar is clamped to my workbench until tomorrow.