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I recently had an old Martin guitar come into the shop for some work. With John Hall's help we were able to determine that this is a model 2 from 1890. It was strung with steel strings which is way to much tension for this little guy. Maybe that is why the left part of the x brace was completely broken in half. Someone has tried to repair it but improperly. With John's help we determined that to do it right the back needed to be removed so that we could get inside the guitar. The bindings, tuner knobs, heel and end caps and rosette rings are ivory. The bridge pins appear to be plastic, , not original. The back and sides are Brazilian rosewood and the top spruce. On a scale of 1 to 10 the pucker factor was a good solid 12 as I removed the back. It took me at least 2 hours to remove it. Care was taken to keep the ivory bindings and the dark/light back purfling veneers intact. Now that the back is off I can get into the restoration of the braces.

more pics

Good work Robbie. Thanks for the Pictures?

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EddieLee

very cool! you must have nerves of steel.

That is excellent work ! Love the pics to , the process is alot easier to comprehend when its can be visualized THANK YOU for helping this subforum get going with this excellent work and Post !!

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Looks like great work thus far. At least it was just using steel strings and the braces are broken... They could have been "repaired" with a generous slathering of gorilla glue. I look forward to seeing this restoration as it progresses, that guitar looks like it should clean up very nicely.

I hope you're taking lots of measurements. I bet a lot of forum members would love to have plans or at least a tracing for a size 2 (including me!!) I love those old small body guitars

It looks like the back is in excellent shape from the pics. Does it have any cracks?
Also, it seems like removing the back took a lot of the lining off of the sides. Do you plan to reuse the linings or make new lining?

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PMoMC

The back and sides are in great shape. Only a couple of minor cracks in the sides. I will reuse the same kerfing/linings

Robbie, I'm enjoying this one. I hope you show in detail how you put the back on, I have to do the same thing to an old Gibson I have in the shop.

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Amazing. Thanks for the reply.

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Looks like a lot of fun. I too would love it if you produced a plan from that. I find it interesting that they use 5 braces for the back and those are beefy ones too!