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I have the binding all glued on, and most of it is trimmed down; even the neck binding came out ok. I was doing some final tuning before I start filling and sealing; the maple sides for some reason don't like scraping, so I'll fill, seal, and sand.

Then I heard some creaking, squeaking sound squeezing the belly to see how it moves. It is right where the lower transverse bar is, near the treble edge. Nice.

I'll have to drill the pin hole in the bottom tomorrow, I always forget about that, and put the Luthierlights light in there, (do you guys use them? they are great) and a mirror and see what I have, and how in the world I'm gonna fix it.

First I have to take out the baroque stuff in the sound hole to do it. Didn't they think ahead back then? The 2 inch diameter isn't going to make it easy either.

It sounds like an old rocking chair. Any ideas of what it could be? No noise in the middle, and no noise at all just tapping it, only when squeezing it. I guess you shouldn't squeeze guitars or Charmin.

Fixing is the part that I least enjoy. I'm happy when it's fixed, and that's about it. I've taken the belly, and a back off of a violin; that's a piece of cake. I even took a neck off once. That wasn't.

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Why be normal?

You might throw a couple of strings on it and see if you hear anything when you play them. If it doesn't sound broken, it may not need fixing.

Is that brace tucked into the lining? Perhaps the end of the brace is moving a bit against the side or against the lining? If so, it might be as simple as a bit of glue injected into the pocket that the brace is sitting in.

Yes, it's tucked in. It does seem to be mostly near the edge.

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Why be normal?

I guess I'll have to go into it this afternoon. I'll take the binding off the treble side, and lift that edge of the belly free. I should be able to see what I have then. At least it's all HHG.

Loose joints don't usually make much noise, even when tapped, The creaking is weird.

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Why be normal?

I love that head stock, nicely done.

Well, I got the binding off, and got the side up to just before the to bar. I can see that the bar is tight to the belly everywhere except right where I was popping the top off. BUT, the bar came right out of the liner with the top. Maybe I got lucky?

Good call Mark.

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Why be normal?

I mixed up a fresh 1/2 teaspoon of glue with a teaspoon of water, and after a few minutes in hot water, the brace was glued, and the top glued to the sides, and 3 clamps put on to hold it together. I took the clamps off after an hour or so. This morning, I heated the glue back up, and put the binding back on.

No creaking!

Altogether about 1/2 an hour to take the binding off, 10 minutes to break the top free from the sides, and about 10 minutes each day to glue it back together. So about an hour of real time to fix it. Far better than I expected.

Not having finish on it made it a lot easier.

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Why be normal?