Neck repair advice

Unorthodox · June 2018

So a friend's fairly new Washburn suffered a nasty neck break a while back. His brother tried to fix it with some sort of glue (looks more like some sort of chalk filler tbh) and now it looks worse than ever.

The headstock and neck will no longer sit together due to the excess glue, so I'm looking for any advice as to what would be the best course of action. It's such a shame as there's not a mark on the guitar otherwise.

So far I've tried acetone and isopropyl alcohol to remove the glue, but neither seems to have much of an effect.

Any tips on how best to attempt a repair would be most welcome, cheers.

Image: https://rgillibrand.com/photos/tfb/washburn/washburn1.jpg

Image: https://rgillibrand.com/photos/tfb/washburn/washburn5.jpg

thermionic · June 2018

That’s some break! Looks like it snapped right at the nut.

ICBM · June 2018

That needs a new section grafting in, or a complete new headstock from where the original scarf joint is. It’s essentially unrepairable using the existing wood - it’s too sharply across the grain to glue strongly even if you could clean the old glue off.

AliGorie · July 2018

listen to ICBM Un, way to much work / cost to be repaired - given the cost of the instrument.

BUT if ya find a hobbyist repairer (other than u'r Bro) it may prove an interesting challenge for them.

When I did the instrument building course we did a section on 'major repairs' and I repaired a similar but more diagonal break.

Amount of gluing area is important for 'stressed' joints - yours has to little of that so as ICBM says diagonally re-cutting the break and splicing in a piece with a larger gluing area.

At collage they had a supply of 'broken' and damaged stringed instruments but I had elected to do a headstock / neck break repair, they're werent any with THAT kinda damage - so the tutor took one from the store room and brought one with a soundboard crack and told me to lay the guitar on the floor with the headstock on a baton of wood and STAMP on it AAAAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHHH. I almost couldn't bring myself to do it - after nigh 50yrs of carefully 'looking after' these objects I was to deliberately damage one - that WAS - not a good feeling.

Unorthodox · July 2018

Thanks for the info ICBM and Ali.

Guessing it's only value now is for parts. Real shame as it's pretty much brand new

Funkfingers · July 2018

ICBM said:

a complete new headstock from where the original scarf joint is.

... is the correct answer.

AliGorie said:

way too much work / cost to be repaired - given the cost of the instrument.

It might have been easier to evaluate this if the OP mentioned the exact model number.

Scarf jointed headed stock and no-name (probably Jin-Ho) machineheads suggest a mid to low priced instrument. Laminated back and sides. Possibly, solid soundboard. Reasonable quality transducer and controls system. e.g. The HD30.

Unorthodox · July 2018

It's an HJ40SCE - http://www.washburn.com/products/acoustics/HJ40SCE.html

Funkfingers · July 2018

Thanks. MSRP is slightly over four hundred Pounds Sterling. No harm in asking a few repairers to quote prices for replacing the headstock.

Only your friend can decide what proportion of four hundred quid is worth spending on the repair work.

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