Replica Les Paul rebuild

WezV

Anyone who has worked on guitars a bit will have had an accident to fix at some point.  Most will have had a drill hole to fill. it is what it is.


Larry Robinson, the inlay artist, tells the story of how he learned inlay due to drilling a hole through the front of an Alembic bass on the first day of his job with them 

paulnb57

Wish I had a quid for every time I cocked up something on a guitar, shit  happens

normula1

I was really upset when I did exactly the same thing when adding a middle pickup to my ESP tele many years ago before I knew better

WezV

Thats Larry Robinson story.     Bear in mind that the $2k figure he quotes would likely be 5- 10 times that for a new Alembic these days

PhilKing

In 1975 you could get an original 50's Les Paul for less than that!  I was selling guitars then and know.  Even in 1982 I stupidly didn't buy a 1957 goldtop because it was really green, checked and worn, but the price was $2,000.  I kick myself over it a lot, since I would love a reliced goldtop!

Andyjr1515

WezV said:

Yeah.   I drilled 4 small holes either side of the tenon. Once the fretboard was off


The only specialist equipment was a glue bottle with needle.   I used it to squirt boiling water into the holes and used the normal clothes iron to keep everything warm.   Literally rinse and repeat for about 30 minutes  until things start to loosen

Ah...great info,  @WezV ;.  Never thought of using just water.  Thanks

WezV

anyway, less about how it happened and more about how we fix it   

I hope everyone appreciates the warts and all approach to these threads.   Sometimes you have to wait a bit to see the plan pay off.

I have the plug installed and leveled off.  I'm fairly happy, but there is still more to do.  I will show pics now, so you can see all the stages, but it will be a lot longer before we see this looking its best.

In terms of results:
Grain match - 9/10
tightness of plug - 8/10
Colour match - 2/10



And with parts


Grain - I knew my filler piece was a little rift sawn.  I accounted for this when inlaying, but still ended up slightly off target... bloody close though and the guard helps hide the most noticeable mismatch

Tightness of plug - its pretty close, but there is that top corner between the oval and chip out that's a bit darker.  Thankfully this is right on a grain line so should be an easy place for a disguise.  Also a darker line on the edge under the guard

Colour - I didn't pay much attention to this when choosing my filler piece, focused on the grain and species match instead.   I wasn't expecting this sycamore to be quite so dark from the colour we could see in the hole. Its not a great colour match at this stage... but it is something I can work with

As it is, I could amber coat it all and it would look fine from most angles and jump out from others.  I can do a few extra things with stains and finish to help prevent that.  @philking has asked to aim for a faded burst, so I want something that works with as light a finish as possible... that means no stains yet.

First step is to strip the top, then I will use wood bleach on the whole face to get the colours a bit closer.

I'm going for Rustin's Wood Bleach as I have used it with good results before. It lightens the wood but doesn't kill grain or figure. Its a 2 part system.  You apply the first solution and it draws all the tannins out, actually goes darker.   then you put the second solution on and the bleaching begins.   I will try and get pics of these stages to show the transformation

That should get me to a good place where a bit of fake wood graining does the rest.   If you use the bleach on mahogany you can get it pale enough to spray a yellow without any white base coat

will be interesting to see what's under the burst though... always the chance it was done in a dark burst for a reason... hopefully it was just those grain flecks you can see near the bridge volume 

WezV

Andyjr1515 said:

WezV said:

Yeah.   I drilled 4 small holes either side of the tenon. Once the fretboard was off


The only specialist equipment was a glue bottle with needle.   I used it to squirt boiling water into the holes and used the normal clothes iron to keep everything warm.   Literally rinse and repeat for about 30 minutes  until things start to loosen

Ah...great info,  @WezV ;.  Never thought of using just water.  Thanks

It works in 2 ways.

firstly, the boiling water is dissolving and washing glue out of the join.  you can even help this by sucking the water back out with a  syringe. 

secondly, the water you add will steam, or at least stay hot, when its heated with the iron.


Obviously you don't want to wet things too much,  but its not usually an issue as long as you give it plenty of time to settle again after the removal

Like fretboard removal, It feels like nothing is happening for ages, then things just start to loosen and it can be rocked out

WezV

WezV said:

will be interesting to see what's under the burst though... always the chance it was done in a dark burst for a reason... hopefully it was just those grain flecks you can see near the bridge volume 

Just stripped the top, and yep, it was a dark burst for a reason.    I 

It has a small intrusion right on  the edge and a few more grain flecks

Dry


And wet




Next will be bleaching to make this all paler.

That may help a bit with the knot situation too... but even if it doesn't I am still not gonna go straight for the dark burst.  Will start pale and work up to it to try and get just enough coverage that it doesn't jump out, but not so much that the great figure round the edge is lost.

skippy76

Thats going to look spot on when you're done Wez

WezV

Bleached.  Wet in both shots

davros

That's made quite a difference. What do you use? Domestos?

WezV

Haha , no.   It needs to be a wood bleach.    Some just remove stains and weathering, but rustins wood bleach will lighten wood too

sawyer

Looking awesome! What's the planned final finish? 

WezV

A nicely faded out burst.... if possible.

Supportact

Following this. Very interesting thread!

WezV

This is the bleach



How it looks when A goes on


And a before and after dry shot



Still a colour difference, but its a lot less than it was so should be mostly disguised in finishing.    This kind of repair is rarely invisible, but I want to get it to the point you have to look for it and your eye isn't drawn to it.

Most of the pinkish tones have gone, so I won't have to go with a heavy amber colour to stop it looking muddy. Figure should show more.   

Andyjr1515

Interesting.  I've never come across wood bleach before.  

guitargeek62

normula1 said:

I was really upset when I did exactly the same thing when adding a middle pickup to my ESP tele many years ago before I knew better

I stupidly did the same when working on my Bullet Mustang last year! Thankfully that one was bought to be a project test-bed, so it’ll get repaired ‘properly’ at some point, along with a full body refinish

WezV

Andyjr1515 said:

Interesting.  I've never come across wood bleach before.  

I haven't used it in this context before.

It's really useful for getting maple as pale as possible when you want a primary colour finish, like a nice trans blue.   On this top it would have been impossible before the bleach, but could now be done(not that it will be).


It's a bit unpredictable in how well it will actually work... but if anyone wants a rosewood board lightening I'm willing to give it a go