Official Luthiers Forum!

When I renovated my house 22 years ago, it was built in Ottawa 1967, I pulled at a 2 x 6 piece of quartersawn spruce anual rings 16 to 20 per inch. I built one uke out of it and I am considering making a 3 or 4 piece archtop guitar with some of it. i also recently found some 55 year old cedar quarter sawn and would like to try some of it on a uke. The cedar however does have some hairline cracks which I can see gluing but they are dark. Is there any way I can get rid of the dark color.

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Mike McNerney

Tearing your own house down to build guitars... That is some serious dedication. I just want to give you kudos on that

If the cracks are dark they are probably old and contaminated with patina and withered such that they will not come back together well. But I can't handle the stuff so it's hard to say.

I've heard of people using deionized water to clean the dirt out of cracks. I've just used tap water - some clean up quite good and some only O.K.