Old Gibson L2 restoration.

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blackalex1952
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Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by blackalex1952 » Mon Nov 13, 2017 1:32 pm

I am currently working on a Gibson 1910 L2 or L3 archtop guitar. The back is braced and flat. All online pics of these old Gibsons have arched backs with a recurve. This one has a flat maple back which is compromised by lifted braces, longitudinal cracks and both concave and convex spots. The cracks are following glue lines as the back was made from three pieces.
I am wondering if any forum members have experience with a few of these and can tell me about these guitars? Is there any record of info re flat and carved backs on these models? I am wondering whether to restore this back or to carve an arched one.
Gibson in 1910 pushed out 30 guitars a week. This doesn't have a serial no but has a manufacture number which the owner has used to date it.
Cheers, Ross
"Everything I say on the topic is based solely upon inexperience and assumption!"

blackalex1952
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by blackalex1952 » Tue Nov 14, 2017 2:36 pm

Gibson are saying that this guitar is most likely an L-1.
Here is a repair method I sometimes use and have deployed on this guitar:
The splits in the back had also warped so that either side of the join the back panel undulated up and down and was lifting up either side of the crack the followed by an uneven curved depression on each side. The back was made from four pieces. The centre seam was reinforced with a marriage strip, but marriage strips were left off the two outside joins. It's amasing how a 1mm thick cross grain marriage strip can hold a join for 107 years, given the abysmal condition of the other un married joins.
I "mine propped" the concave sections either side of the cracks. I then sat the 1/4 inch flat steel on top of the hide glue pot to heat them through. The steel has packing tape on it to prevent the glue from sticking to it. I then heated the join somewhat with a heat gun, then worked hot glue into the cracks in the usual way. The heated bars were clamped on to the back and warmed further with the heat gun. Neodymium magnets were place inside the guitar, they are attracted to the steel and help level the join. This method has the advantage of keeping the glue join warm giving good penetration, more clamp time and helps flatten the wood. There is also the advantage of mine propping and regluing braces and marriage strip (held by magnets) in the same operation. Not so easy with a non flat back, but I reckon a little heat and a radius curve to compare to I could come up with a steel radius if I had to. Maybe aluminium...
One of the diffuculties with HHG is that it cools quickly, the more clamp time available the less panic...So I'm going to use the longer steel piece to inlay in the centre of my rope and wedge plate joining jig so that I can heat it up with the heat gun just before glue up and the rope and wedge tightening. Al that needs to happen is that the rope gets a little tangled whilst wrapping it on to the jig prior to wedging and the glue can jell before the wedges are tightened. Heating the join after the tightening means that the wedges are masking the heat penetration where they are pressing on the soundboard and back. Cheers Ross
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simso
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by simso » Tue Nov 14, 2017 7:58 pm

Nice way of doing it, I traditionally just pop the back of and do it, but very interested in the way you are doing yours.

Steve
Steve
Master of nothing,

Do your own repairs - http://www.mirwa.com.au/How_to_Series.html

blackalex1952
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by blackalex1952 » Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:40 am

Nice way of doing it, I traditionally j ... ing yours.
I was worried about getting the old nitro bindings back neatly, they look brittle. I have also had sides move after a back has been removed, and didn't want that to happen, not wanting to make a special mold to store it in. Steve, do you have any tricks when dealing with plastic bindings made in 1910? That back still might come off as a couple of the braces have definitely changed curvature over long years of this guitar slowly getting knocked around. I'm finding out more about this box daily, Gibson now has some pix for reference. Apparently it's L-1 and was made when Gibson sold his business and name and took off to New York. It was a little hard to tell at first as the back was so distorted and lifted from the braces. But it looks like the back was originally around a 40ft radius. Cheers Ross
"Everything I say on the topic is based solely upon inexperience and assumption!"

simso
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by simso » Wed Nov 15, 2017 6:58 pm

blackalex1952 wrote:
Wed Nov 15, 2017 11:40 am
Steve, do you have any tricks when dealing with plastic bindings made in 1910?
Yep, I remove them and put non flamnmable non breakable ones back on :).

Have had customers tell me no they want genuine celluloid ones or they want the celluloid patch repaired and so forth, I just politley tell them to find someone else.

Its like me saying to a tyre place, hey mate any chance you can get some period perfect white walls for my 1920s car ( which I dont have).

Steve
Steve
Master of nothing,

Do your own repairs - http://www.mirwa.com.au/How_to_Series.html

blackalex1952
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by blackalex1952 » Thu Nov 16, 2017 4:47 pm

For those following my thread. The method I described often works, but after repairing the back plate I realised that the braces were so badly deformed that I needed to pop the back and replace two of them.
In doing do, I discovered the Gibson 1910 method of fitting braces to a carved soundboard. The braces have saw cuts and are capped with a strip of wood post fitting. The braces are not let in to the sides, rather they taper down to nothing just short of the liners, then the cap continues in to the liners. IMHOP the guitar is overbuilt and the recurve could be thinned from the inside. The bracing is square and chunky and the old brace pattern leaves a bit to be desired. The two "parallel" braces converge towards the lower bout. The modern archtops with parallel braces are wider in the lower bout than the top bout, the soundboard carve either side of the soundhole is strongly recurved which looks good but I suspect further limits the effective soundboard area and with modern bracing the two inner ladder braces are not incorporated. The recurve round the soundhole can be clearly seen in the photo I posted above of the guitar with the spool clamps on it.
If that soundhole recurve was attempted on a modern X braced archtop build, it would be possible to do, but the braces would have to be fitted to this curve which would be difficult to execute and I don't believe it would be acoustically as good as the way the archtops evolved over the years. Having said that, parallel bracing would be easy enough to execute with that soundboard arching.
P1030442.JPG
-Ross
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simso
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by simso » Thu Nov 16, 2017 6:14 pm

Look at that, mmm mmm mmm.

Steve
Steve
Master of nothing,

Do your own repairs - http://www.mirwa.com.au/How_to_Series.html

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kiwigeo
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by kiwigeo » Thu Nov 16, 2017 10:29 pm

Interesting pics thanks for sharing Ross
Martin

blackalex1952
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Re: Old Gibson L2 restoration.

Post by blackalex1952 » Fri Nov 17, 2017 11:55 am

Something else I noticed about this old Gibson. The liners are kerfed triangular, as per usual, made of maple. However there is a 1mm maple strip between the liners and the guitar sides, which is the height of the kerfed liners. (12mm) This is sitting proud of the sides by 3mm and the kerfing glued in afterwards and aligned with the top of the maple strip. This forms the binding ledge, the 3mm + approx 2mm back equals the binding height. Interesting...Ross
"Everything I say on the topic is based solely upon inexperience and assumption!"

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