Hairline cracks on guitar neck under fretboard pictures. I have a strat that i stupidly put a neck on where the heel was too wide and it put a good size crack into the wood, but with the right size neck on its not a problem and doesnt affect the guitar really. This shortish video looks at neck pocket cracks the scourge of just about all bolt necked guitars bought online. I think the guitar just developed one where the nut was installed. Also where the neck joins the body, some cracking due to stress is seen in the finish. The two on the face of the guitar between the neck pocket and the neck pickup rout are as a result of the neck being hit at the headstock and pushing the neck into the body theres not a lot of wood there and it can crack happened to my beater made no difference at all to the tuning stability of the guitar as others say, if it aint broke, dont fix, it so to speak. Probably the only reason it was sold, which tends me towards being pissed off at the seller. About all i know to do is wick a tiny flow of water thin ca glue into the finish crack to help stop it from expanding. The location allows for the crack to be opened quite easily by wedging carefully into the tuner hole.
I have an applause ae28 electricacoustic guitar that plays pretty well, but doesnt look so great. String swing sideways guitar hangers behind me dava picks. How to repair cracks in your acoustic guitar if you own an acoustic guitar long enough, chances are good that youll have to deal with the repair of a crack in the wood. This process is known as cavitation and is one of the. Ibanez is notorious for the stress cracks on the older heel joint models. The seven joints in the neck are surrounded by synovial fluid which acts as a lubricant during motion of the neck. Strat neck pocketheel crack repair telecaster guitar forum. To repair these cracks the stress must be eliminated by removing the pickguard and. They start from the body joint and go all the away up to the nut. He kept on saying that people play with such cracks for.
By ibanez rg 450 dx guitar neck with binding and sharktooth inlay. It never seemed to affect anything, playability, tone etc. Top cracks are tricky because thats where the most stress is applied. Normally i wouldnt be annoyed my strat is battered and had stress cracks before i bought it, but that is my playing out guitar wheras my sil special was a custom order with a sparkle paint job and it annoyed me that a high end guitar developed this problem within a. You can glue and clamp it up good as new, maybe paint th. Not even with the help of your uncle that has glue in his. Fixing a cracked gibson neck silesia guitars guitar setups.
Still plays just fine but now im worrying myself lol. Its nature makes it difficult to penetrate cracks and it doesnt grip wood in the same way as other glues its rarely a first choice adhesive for these jobs. At bunker we believe that the neck is the backbone of a really great guitar or bass. A stress riser in the finish, typically the neck pocket, can bring all sorts of things out that may have otherwise lay hidden. This usually happens when the guitar is allowed to dry out, causing the two halves of the top to come unglued at the center seam. Neck cracked under the nut epiphone electrics gibson. Naturally, external cracks and scratches will occur due to physical impact. Knowing how to evaluate the seriousness of a crack will allow you to determine whether to call a repair person immediately or whether it might be ok to leave it alone for a. A sudden jolt to a guitar neck due to something like tossing the case into a luggage hold could easily crack or snap an unsupported headstock. Crepitus neck is the crunching, grinding, or popping sound produced when you move your neck.
Are they caused by the freboard drying or something. It will be in the finish, maybe even some old contamination coming to light where the paint hasnt bonded. Impact of neck crack repair on value the unofficial. Ditto what eyema believer says, a stress crack isnt going to go across the grain like that. How to repair a crack in a solid top acoustic guitar our. Theres a thin crack under the guitar not far from the jack input. Hence, my thought to open the crack a little and insert glue with a syringe. If you have not already done so, you might want to seek some relief for the damage if it occurred during shipping, or from the original seller if heshe failed to disclose the damage. This synovial fluid contains gasses like nitrogen and carbon dioxide which may form bubbles and due to increase stress on the neck these bubbles may burst resulting in a popping sound. Also i tried pushing both side of the crack but apparently nothing moves. As it happens, i was able to inject glue into all the cracks and clamp them with the result that the neck pocket is now solid and the guitar is a classic with a couple of fret levellings over the. After a fair amount of moisture loss an instruments wood panels begin to shrink. I bought a jackson dk2m that had it and checked myself by removing the neck.
Obviously a stress crack that started at the tuning machine screw hole. Was the guitar shipped under normal string tension. As i remember there were nocheck marks onnthe neck or headstock, but the top was chock full of very fine finish checking cracks. These cracks are on both sides of neck right under the ebony fretboard. Were going to start with some relatively straightforward stuff. Therefore, invest in a good guitar case and practice caution when the guitar is being used. The neck was cracked in several places, and the more cracks, the harder it is to put together.
If anyone has a good touchup method for such a crack, especially in white, i would be very interested. The backs of guitars probably finish third in terms of frequency of cracks. If you do manage to break or crack your guitars neck or peghead, dont panic. Neck pocket cracks can run the gamut from innocent little nonissues, all the way up to total loss. Welcome to rguitar, a community devoted to the exchange of guitar related information and entertainment. Eventually this change can prove too stressful for the wood and it cracks. Because of this, we will not build our instruments with anything less than a tension free neck. Repairing cracks in acoustic guitars examples of cracks caused. Its very common with bolt on necks and is probably a crack in the finish, even if its in the wood, its not a big deal. My theory is that it has a lot to do with the shape of the guitar at that point.
So youve somehow managed to break your guitar head clean off the neck. If you have guitar related questions, use the search field or ask the community. A lot of my ibanez guitars had the cracks, or breaks and ive repaired them with thin superglue. With this in mind, its probably a gibsonepiphone design with the extremely slanted head and you probably dropped it. Ebmm john petrucci stress cracks in neckjoint page 4. The local guitar shop wants to break the neck and glue back on, what does not enthuse me at all. Fixing a cracked gibson neck silesia guitars guitar. The majority of broken necks tend to be relatively straightforward. The stress lines look like they were caused by the headstock being. The owner of the store who is also a very good friend of both myself and my. But they should have been mentioned, and that guitar fell from at least cartrunk height onto a paved parking lot while cased, of course. If left unattended these cracks can spread open and create even more costly and highly visible repairs. Finally, ensure that the pickguard on your guitar is properly installed.
If the placement is wrong, the feature will exert stress on the body and the shell will be damaged. I even went through replacing the fretboard and the stress of doing that did not affect the crack. Since it affects resale value, id like to fix it if its possible without refinishing the neck or breaking it in half and putting it back together. A repair that was cheap and easy to do with materials i could buy from an auto repair shop. Going to heaver strings puts enough additional bending torque on the neck that the truss rod will require adjusting to bring it back. How to repair cracks in your acoustic guitar guitar alliance. The crack doesnt follow the wood grain, it is perpendicular and it ends with a spider end that goes like a crack on a windshield. Im assuming a wedding ring, cheap capo, or leaning it up against something instead of putting it back in the case, or using a stand. Tips on repairing acoustic guitar cracks proaudioland. Cracks in the body of your solid top acoustic guitar are often cause by physical damage to the guitar or shrinkage due to a lack of humidity.
This neck was cracked when the guitar hit the floor headstock first and is not the typical crack behind the nut youll find from over tightening of the nut, although the repair is the same for both. They were also really long, following the grain of the wood. Less than 1% one percent of all the ebs that have come through here have had stress cracks upon arrival. Many electric guitar builders stress the need for a very tightfitting neckneck pocket. What to do if you break your guitars neck guitarless. Noticed last night these tiny hairline cracks on either side of the neck of it that seem to both start right at the corner of the nut.
Cracks on ibanez neck solidbody guitar and bass chat. The cracks might be only finish cracks, and they dont look fatal to me, at all. This is a forum where guitarists, from novice to experienced, can explore the world of guitar through a variety of media and discussion. Stress crack in fender neck joint seymour duncan forum. How safe is neck crackingexercises to stop cracking your neck. How to repair hairline cracks around strat neck pocket. A picture, as always, would help quite a bit in recommending next steps. One of the most common instances is actually not a crack at all, but a centerseam separation. To repair these cracks the stress must be eliminated by removing the pickguard and reattaching or replacing it. I will look around to see if i have picts of this area. Are these hairline cracks on the side of the neck serious. In an effort to avoid a repeat, and keep the new adhesive from pulling up wood fibers if removed again, this bare area of wood beneath the guitar is usually sealed with finish.
If the guitar is relatively new, i would get it back to where i purchased it. I find this the most difficult aspect of the build. All that repetitive stress adds up to alot on the neck joint. Matters of improper humidity usually dont affect the thicker, harder woods on the back as much. A deep tissue massage is helpful for mildtomoderate strains because it reduces muscle spasm, combats inflammation and promotes relaxation.
This isnt necessarily an indication of a cheap, poorly made guitar. Depending on the severity and location of the crack, a repair is as simple as stabilizing the wood and applying glue to secure it. These necks use a 38 cold rolled steel bar to support the strings at the headstock, thus removing all string tension stress from the neck, leaving the neck free to resonate as it should. If the pickguard shrinks considerably a crack can develop on either side of it.
Pop your guitar in its case or on a secure hanger and you reduce your chances of breaking your head. These sounds are indicative of the presence of air trapped in the joints or subcutaneous tissue. Before even getting a neck on it, a slight hair of a crack appeared in the finish. Stress crack on neck joint, or just a finish crack. This crack is tough to see as its nearly perfectly closed so ill save the multiple views until i spread it. Your desire to crack your neck may be tied to an underlying muscle strain, perhaps from an old sports injury or motor vehicle accident. There are a couple of cracks in the thick plasticy finish. My 1989 ibanez rg550 has had a hairline crack running down the neck for like 45 years, during which the crack hasnt gotten any wider or longer at least as far as i can remember. Repairing a super thin hairline crack in the neck or leave. I would guess for most people to buy such an guitar the discount would have to be large, such as 40 to 50 percent.
Repairing a super thin hairline crack in the neck or leave as it is. The backs are usually a little thicker than either the top or sides, therefore a bit tougher. What looked like a scratch, turned out to be a smile crack on the neck, that became visible when changing strings. The thing about headstock cracks and repairs, is that the general guitar buyer is very fearful about it coming apart from the stress of the strings. I dont know a ton about guitars but are these serious. Ibanez rg 450 dx guitar neck with binding and sharktooth inlay 24 jumbo frets 25. Ive stripped several guitars of their paint that had the neck cracks shown on the. Its a 24 year old guitar, and the only dings and finish checking are on the back of the neck. I also chose to return to original condition by mildly. Stress cracks are not uncommon for bolt on guitars and are usually on the lacquer only.
Neck joint stress cracks ive had a few guitar where a crack would develop at the neck joint over time, musicman included. I was so upset yesterday as this crack happened when the guitar luthier was installing new tuners on my bass. That means that less than 1 in 100 guitars has had a stress crack. As long as it penetrates your problem will be solved. I inspected the damaged on my malmsteen strat some of you know that a drunk decided to do a pete townsend on a few of my guitars. It is ending at the nut and starting 10 15 centimeters below. It is almost always a finish crack in that location and is very common, moreso on guitars with very tight neck pocket fit.
I rarely hear that anyone gets them in the newer style aanj neck joint though i know i dont have any on any of my axes with the aanj. If anything also, these pictures make the cracks looks worse than they actually are. In all fairness to eb, they are currently sorting out a new body for me and have handled it very well. Most of the worst and hardesttorepair cracks happen on a guitars top. The crack is along the scarf line where the manufacturer glued an extension to the neck blank in order to form the peghead itself.