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Okay, way back in 1985 - I built my first solidbody electric for a client who wanted an all walnut "The Paul", but with some custom touches like rounded body edges and a molded neck joint. I used a solid board of walnut for the body, while the neck was 3 pieces of walnut with an ebony board and jumbo frets. All chrome hardware, and a pair of DiMarzio Super D's for power. As I remember, it weighed about 11 pounds or so.... It turned out great, and the guy loved it. I took one picture with an old Kodak 110 (remember those?). Here it is...

https://imgur.com/Yn37qkJ


Two weeks ago.... I hadn't seen Troy or the guitar in 34 years, and I wondered what had happened to it. I heard he was back in the town and still owned it. I got a call - "Would I like to finish it up for him?" Of course I did. He had the guitar refinished, and installed new gold hardware and a set of Duncan '59s. Sometime in the past he had a Gibson logo and pineapple/crown inlayed on the peghead (I don't do inlays). He wanted to "make it new" and pass it down to his grandkids.

I checked the guitar out, and noted the changes. The guitar needed the barest hint of a fret level (Troy still uses .008's), and a new bone nut was needed. Squared that all away and got it set up with fresh strings. A few tweaks, and it played like a dream! Sounded good, too. I took these pix last weekend....
The gold truss rod cover and control knobs are still on backorder from Allparts.

https://imgur.com/wryoMcy

https://imgur.com/JGoG0U3

https://imgur.com/0xeu4QS

https://imgur.com/0kAraat

It was super neat to see the guitar again. Troy says he still has the original receipt somewhere and will dig it out and scan it for me soon. Pretty cool deal to see an old creation still alive and gigging!

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Nice story and guitar, Chris.

Sweet.

I had a similar reunion with Jim who I knew in high school. He put together our little old timey string band ten years later. Jim, the fiddler, John and I had trekked down to San Francisco to buy Jim a brand new D-28 with his life savings, around 1975. I was doing repairs and brace shaving, having hung out at Jon Lundberg's store in Berkeley, pumping the people there to learn about hotrodding Martin dreadnoughts. Jim liked the results I got, so he had me shave his, warranty be damned. Our band played local gigs for about a year, then our mandolin player moved to Hawaii, I went back to school and our fiddler moved back east, so that was the end of the band. We lost track of each other until about 2013. I tracked down Jim on the interwebs , and he still had the same D-28, by now well worn and well played. It needed a neck reset and refretting, so I did the job for him in exchange for a nice old Stewart banjo. It wasn't like seeing anything I'd built like yours, Chris, but it was a nice time, recalling old times with that guitar and the string band. He and his wife come up every year for a local folk festival to perform with his D-28. Even though it was built at a low point in Martin's history, it has aged better than most of us.

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formerly known around here as burbank
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com