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I have finished repairing the 1890 Martin guitar that came into the shop on life support. A special thanks to John hall of Blues Creek Guitars for his advice and support on this project. Here is a video of the repair and some audio of the guitar being played.
I hope you enjoy it.

Thanks for sharing that Robbie! Truly a historic piece.

Doug

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Doug

Don't let fear or common sense stop you from trying to build something

Thanks for sharing, Robbie. What a great little guitar! And it was especially nice to see you bringing her back to life.

Max

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Max Bishop
Brighton, Michigan

I have your counterpart from 1857. They are great guitars. Your skill resurrected this guy and you took it from intensive care back to the playground. Sounds great.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

Wow! Thanks for sharing this. I'm inspired. Wow! T

Hi Robbie,

Great job repairing that guitar. What method did you use to repair the top cracks on such an old guitar? Did you spline the cracks, or were you able to reglue them without a spline? I wonder because I have a 1943 Martin 018 which I have been carefully considering repairing over the years, and it has some old pretty wide cracks in places.

Best,

Jonas

I was able to re-glue the cracks and then I cleated them from underneath.

Very very nice Robbie. Inspiring, and nice playing as well

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Thank You and Best To All

The plate thicknesses of that old guitar are pretty surprising by today's standards - or are they? Does anyone know if that was standard for those days? Very thin and very light? And very prone to breakage? Cracks? Did guitar building just become something that needed to last longer over the years hence the thicker plates of today's guitars? Does anyone build that thin?

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Thank You and Best To All

Great repair job. I hope it lasts another 120 years
Great playing too

Hey Robbie,

Outstanding work! I really liked the song you started playing at around 5:50. What song was that?

Thank you,
Rob

That is a by a Brazilian composer named Paulinho Nogueira and is called Bachianinha number 1

Thanks! I am going to give learning that piece of music a try.

Robbie, thanks for sharing this with us. Impressive as usual. I am looking forward to meeting you in a 2 weeks time.

Mick

Likewise Mick. I look forward to making some sawdust together.

best movie i have seen in a long long time. That whole process should have been documented and played on pbs or discovery. truly excellent work on your part. I have been waiting to see how it turned out. how was the pucker factor when you were taking it apart? sounds great and again good work.

Thank you for the compliment. On a scale of 1 to 10 the pucker factore was a good solid 11.

Nicely done restoration.
I wonder if that guitar has been refinished at some point? Often on the older guitars the finish becomes clouded and makes the rosewood almost appear to be Mahogany colored. Stripping the finish and light sanding brings back the dark rosewood color. I wonder if that could account for some of the thinness of the scantlings?
I have a 1-21 "New Yorker" that came back to me with a sanded top. It had the typical top gouge from the lack of a pick guard, which the new owner decided to sand smooth .
The guitar you restored appears to have some waffleing on the sides. Is this the case, or just an artifact from the camera?
Again, nicely done, and not overly done restoration!

Thank you Clay. I have no idea if the guitar had been refinished. The finish was in pretty good shape but so was the entire guitar for that matter. There is some rippling in the sides. The sides are only 1.5mm thick and had cracks in them.