Official Luthiers Forum!

Hey all,

A few months back I posted some pictures of a SG style guitar I built in which the neck angle was wrong. Well I took off the neck (painstakingly) and rebuilt it…. And still got the angle wrong! Turns out I’m not great at this but hey, I’m still learning. Anyway, the neck ended up being pretty close to straight so I thought “what the hell” and bought a hard tail bridge for kicks just to see if it would work. Well wouldn’t you know it, it actually works pretty well. Action on the low E is questionable but at this point I’ll take it.

My question, though, is this; what is everyone’s tips for repairing the lacquer on the spots that I pressed in dowels where my tune-o-matic bridge used to sit? I shouldn’t have to sand back all the lacquer, right? Can I do drop fill in those spots? Here is a photo


Thanks!


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Is it finished in nitro? If so, you can fill with more nitro. Polyurethane or similar, use thin CA. Whatever you use fill in thin layers, and once proud of the surrounding surface, let it cure really well. For nitro, couple of weeks, for CA, overnight. Then scrape the high points done close to level, wet sand and buff. Check out StewMac’s YouTube channel for videos on basic finish repair.

Another tip for future jobs like this - cut face-grain plugs of matching wood instead of using dowels for a closer grain match. Glad to hear you got it playing!


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Perhaps a "tramp stamp" inlay to hide the plugs?

Yeah it’s just a nitro finish, with a couple layers of vinyl sealer on the wood before the lacquer.

Thanks for the tip about the dowels too


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What Josh said (Clay too ) and I wanted to add two thing.

1). Do not use accelerator with CA just let it cure naturally overnight like Josh suggested. He's speaking of a quality CA too not the little tubes in the grocery store checkout line. We use Bob Smith thin for this but any quality CA will work.

2). With either nitro or CA you may get witness lines or the repair may show (it may not either time will tell). If it's imperative that it not show refinishing the entire top is really the only way to be sure.

Impossible to hide so make them a feature. Endless possibilities with a circle.

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