Official Luthiers Forum!

I'm absolutely tickled. I've not purchased a guitar for myself to play, aside from a few vintage guitars but those are more investments, since I bought my first piece of junk guitar in 1990. It was a Bentley plywood dreadnought. I knew nothing about guitars back then except if you wanted a nice one your only choices were Martin or Gibson within any reasonable price. The Bentley was what got me into guitar repair and building in the first place as I thought to myself heck I can make a better guitar then this piece of junk!

But anyway, I've always wanted another luthier built hand made guitar. If for anything to have something to compare too. Once in a while over the last few decades a really nice hand made guitar would come through my shop for repair.

A couple weeks ago I was surfing on the AGF and accidentally clicked on their 'Market Place' sub forum. The first thread was from Luthier Don Sharp who was selling a guitar that he had built years ago and almost completed before his client backed out of the deal and he stored the guitar away, moved locations, and one day opened up this old guitar case and realized that he still had this thing. I could not believe that other people over there didn't jump on it. I could not even get the materials for this guitar for what he sold it for. All it needs is a bit of a fix on the fretboard binding, glue the bridge down and dress the frets and set up.

Very nice BRW dred with a bear claw Sitka top. Can't wait to get this one up and running.

Nice score!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Yes!! Sweet.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Boo Yah!

Glad you got that, I was sorely tempted.

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A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Nice looking guitar.
Many people are daunted by looking at the unfinished parts of the work. If they can't do the work themselves they would have to pay a luthier several hundred dollars to supply and install a bridge, tuning machines, fix the binding, make a nut and saddle and do the set up work, all without being able to evaluate what other problems might be in store.
I once had a thief break into my shop and steal a formica bodied dulcimer (beach use) and an inexpensive mandolin because they had strings on them, leaving behind several nice quality instruments that didn't.
Good score!

I'm surprised he just didn't finish it and sell it.

I just couldn't pass on it. And I'm surprised no one else did... I would probably charge an additional $300 to finish that guitar if someone brought it to me. Maybe as much as $500. Don's base price is $6500... Simple maths to me

I do plan on keeping this guitar though at least for as long as I enjoy it. Funny too I don't even own a dred. I've made only one ever and it was an okay guitar but not great.



People were asking him about that. My guess is this. If you go to his website you see he has a discontinued 'Traditional' series guitar. This is one of them so he probably didn't want to be bothered with it. I'm sure he got his deposit for it when his client backed out then a bit more for the sale then it's out of his hair. Anyway I'm grateful for it.

The other cool thing about having an opportunity like this is just to handle another small shop luthiers guitar especially a very reputable one. Having been doing repairs all these years I've seen a few, some that were amazing and others frankly I wondered how the luthier had managed to get such a reputation. This one falls into the former no doubt, it's a beautifully made guitar.

I always thought one day it might be cool to trade guitars with another hobbyist luthier like myself for that very reason. Just to have someone else's work. All the guitars I have with the exception of a small vintage collection are mine.