This guitar was brought in by an apprehensive young lady and it belonged to an elder sibling, who had since moved to foreign shores for better academic prospects.
If you did not look at the headstock, it looked much like the guitar from a couple of weeks ago, brought in by a father, who’s girl was to return shortly from the US.
Guitar repair – It’s not always the instrument…sometimes it’s the sentiment attached!
Only, this one also had no label to it – a nameless creation.
Like that one, it had all the tell-tale signs of not enough love being shown to it and some more. The young lady had brought in the guitar for just a change of strings but then, I had to point out this to her.
Just looking at the state of the instrument, I knew it was desperately in need of a drink of water, and that was the major reason for the bridge splitting.
Work began with taking off the crusty old strings and the bridgepins – one black one and all – and storing them in the order they came out.
I worked my magic, and like I had promised her, the crack disappeared like it had never been there. The guitar was thoroughly cleaned and polished, fretboard and bridge were given a double drink of elixir after which I put on new strings, and all was good.
The guitar was returned, but not before I replaced that black bridgepin with a white one. I just could not bear the eyesore. Additionally, like I often do, I forgot to take a final photograph. I called up the girl and asked for the photograph and she dutifully obliged.
To my horror, I saw this
Look carefully, there’s a crack appearing where there was one originally.
I had the girl bring in the guitar again, and thinking that maybe, the bridgepin holes were a little too small, I tried reaming the holes. However, except for the E string, which was a little too snug (expectedly so), the other holes were just right for their pins.
Anyway, the job was done all over again and returned to the owner with apologies.
Hope it stays intact!
