Kitten

Thanks for replying guys, I’m taking a bit of a advice & opinion from each of you so.. it looks like I’ll try & learn to play a little tune or two, I can tell you I’m not very good but I’ll keep on fixing them like any good luthier wood. Cheers Kitten

Please Help Me, Any advice, opinion & or comment is welcome & appreciated... photos attached so a customer dropped off his Hummingbird complaining that it was ‘sweating’ after he brought it back from the Bahamas where he’d been living for several years. (He’s owned the guitar for many years) Apparently he has absolutely no idea what has happened to it & I assume the sweating he refers to is the seepage from whatever was inside the guitar coming out. On my initial inspection I thought the Guitar has been scorched or burnt, visually, it wore the trademarks of such. I quizzed Mr HB like no bodies business, more than once, no further info he gave, that’s cool, I like a challenge, but this goes beyond that. I have decided upon my theory, however, 6 months later I still have the Hummingbird hanging up in my workshop, hanging over me, sweating. Nothing seems to work, except perhaps time. My first step was looking inside the Guitar, not good, stained black, there wasn’t really a residue on my fingers when I touched it but I could feel something slightly oily, by the time my hands were on it, whatever it was was well & truly soaked in. I stripped the back & sides, the lacquer was peeling off anyway & I wanted air to get into the grain, maybe letting the Guitar ‘breathe’ instead’ of ‘sweat’ was my plan. The wood was soft; tacky & dark underneath. There was a slight concave to the bottom right hand side, we managed to save that section by making a jig to pull it back out again. I just don’t know how to fix the rest of it. To me it appears that some kind of oil, thick & dark has been poured inside it & there it has sat until it was completely absorbed into the wood and seeping out the other side. I’ve sprinkled bi carb inside, which came out brown & damp, so it did absorb something, I’ve done a acetone sponge bath, methylated spirits wiped down, packed absorbing pads around it, not a lot of change could be seen, applying directional heat makes it ooze and bubble. Air & time seem to be the best & least destructive remedy. Has any one out there experienced anything similar or remotely similar, or can suggest anything at all, Thanks for reading, if nothing else, I feel slightly better getting this off my chest. oh yeah and the customer wants it back like Yesterday... (maybe I should tell him to come & get it)

Hi ~ Thanks for having me ~ My Name is Kitten ~ Im a Luthier from Oz (Australia) i Build, Repair, Service & Restore Guitars, Banjos, Ukuleles (mainly) but all and any other stringed instrument included. I can’t play.. any of them... I haven’t found it necessary, that may sound crazy given my job but it hasn’t been a requirement höwever some find it insulting that I can’t. (They like the way i fix them though.) Do I really have to PlaŸ or NöT ??? That is the question