Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi to you all! Hope you enjoy your holiday long weekend break coming up. I will spend my time off in the workshop.
Recently I was given a hand made Jumbo acoustic guitar from the seventies built by a well respected builder here in Australia. The guitar has had a hard life and I suspect the guitar has got very wet during a flood which over time has caused numerous cracks on the top. You can see the water marks on the inside of the top. The guitar has also had a fall on the head stock head first and the top cracked each side of the neck. The rest of the guitar is in good condition and the back and sides are genuine mahogany.

I have built a new top and glued it up and I am pleased with re-top. It had plastic binding so that was removed and I will install some nice wood binding.

This top is a big mother at one eighth under 17" wide at the lower bout. The old brace design has the lower x brace ends tucked into linings. The tap tone of the new top is big with a short attack. It does have some sustain but not like a dreadnaught I built from the Stew Mac plan recently.

My question to the forum is has anyone seen this style of brace design before? How does tucking the x brace at the lower bout ends affect the performance of the top?

Here re a few pics




Here is the new top


Thank you all

Cheers

Alan