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I have just obtained a 1969 Guild Mach 1 nylon classical. It's all mahogany guitar (back,sides, top and neck). It's a great guitar and sounds and plays wonderfully, but it was very beat up so I decided (with consent from the owner of course) to strip the body and refinish it, which went very smoothly. I also had to clean up and reattach the bridge. All these were easily fixed.
The very worst part is that there is a loose brace on the back of the guitar. There are three horizontal back braces, one towards the top bout, middle bout and bottom bout. The middle one is loose. It says in place but if you put your hand through the sound hole you can wiggle it around. This cause a very annoying buzzing sound when you strum a chord or thumb pick the lowest e, a, and d strings. How should i go about fixing this? I thought about maybe applying some epoxy to dampen the rattling an keep the brace still but I don't know if that would do the trick.
How do you guys think it could be fixed?

It's a great lively and responsive guitar, probably the best nylon i've ever played. I don't care if it's worth anything i just want it to be a player. I''ll be sure to post some pictures of the refinish.

andrew

Andrew;
I slip a feeler guage .002 or 3 under the brace to see how far the separation is first.
Then I can determine how to glue it back on-all at once or sometimes not.
I take the smallest turnbuckles and cut the ends of them and epoxy on wooden blocks.
I cut a V groove in one block & leave the other flat.
The groove goes over the brace-the flat one to the top.
Reach in and do a DRY set up with the buckle(s) and determine if the brace will reseat!
If so then remove them and use the feeler guage to apply glue under the brace and clean the area with a damp cloth-then put the turnbuckles back in and tighten to apply pressure to seat the brace-
NOT to much-you can crack the top-sometimes I put a cam clamp with a cork lined caul on the top over the area the buckle is pushing on so it can apply some pressure and NOT crack the top.

Mike

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Mike Collins