Fryer John's Tanglewood

That's not a spelling mistake. John is not of the monastic persuasion, but runs the most excellent Fish & chip shop - Straits - here in Sheringham. His guitar is a Tanglewood 47B Sundance, which had taken an unfortunate excursion from the top of a TV. Not so much of a problem in itself, but the sharp deceleration onto a hard floor resulted in some bumps and bruises...

Nice big crack in the top, at the lower bout. Lots of finish missing

We think it had hit the ground head first, since there is another ding in the corner of the machine head

And then there is this little one:

Lots of reflections and a small gouge in the finish

So there we go. Some interesting little jobs!

A look around inside produces some interesting pictures:

Those dark lines, near the lining on the extreme left of the picture are a crack in the mahogany top

Since the lining to top joint is sound, we cannot achieve anything by attempting to re-glue that joint, and we must treat this repair as a split in the top. To stabilize this we can introduce some CA adhesive from the outside. But fisrt, we must devise a clamping scheme.

Top clamped

We'll use a spool clamp, with a spacer to cause the clamp to tip into the top rather than following the top contour as it would  normally be used. This means the clamp exerts pressure just inside the top to lining joint, effectively closing the crack. Cling film stops the clamp sticking to the glue.

Here is the 'after' shot, showing the glue has penetrated the joint:

Glue penetration through the crack in the top

Next, drop filling, scraping, and polishing

Drop filling almost complete

The peghead has also had a good dose of drop fill and polish:

and the lower bout repair is finished: