Gretsch White Falcon
This is one of the trickiest neck re-sets,
for a number of reasons ... please read on ...
The original epoxy that was used for
the neck to body dovetail joint; had
"let go" .... and the heel was pulling away
which raised the strings up to the point
where the guitar was unplayable.
The epoxy had the consistency of bubble gum !
It needed to be cleaned out ...
right down to the raw wood;
in preparation for the hide glue
that was used to re-glue
the dovetail for a perfect fit.
The masking / air-brushing / top coating /
shading and rub-out of the finish "touch up" /
at the intersection of the neck and body joint;
was a HUGE part of the work in
re-storing this guitar.
Above and below you can see the "craggy line"
of finish build up. This had to be levelled / water sanded
to guarantee a perfect fit when re-gluing the dovetail
A perfect "mechanical fit" was established
for the male-to-female dovetail joint.
THEN the hot hide glue was applied
and the joint was pressed into place
easily, with ONE clamp.
Once the joint was set ( overnight )
then the real fun began......
The multiple intersections of binding / heel / top / sides /
ALL had to masked off; to expose the small portion of the
finish that needed to be exposed for airbrush shading.
The first 9 frets were replaced. Rick ( Owner )
logs in a lot of hours on this puppy.
This ain't no trophy piece ....
it is a player's guitar.
I setup the right combination of masking / rags /
and ratcheting up the TechDeck ...
to the perfect angle, for each portion of the airbrushing.
After mixing and testing the shading lacquer several times;
I managed to get a decent match to the original finish
for a nice, seamless, transition.
Above and below is a leather lined template
that helps Rick to locate the floating bridge.
The compensated nut relieves the tuning frustration;
especially with the Bigsby tremolo !
The Falcon has landed.
Rick Taylor led the house band at the
25th Firehall Re-Union
Rick ripped into to some "test drive licks",
before the rubber hits the road, for the Gig
on Saturday night.
This template butts up against the rear pickup ring;
and takes all of the guesswork out of
locating the bridge for PERFECT intonation.
