Gibson LG1 1963
This Gibson LG1 (1963) was brought to me by a collector who had the vision to see the value of this wonderful little guitar once fixed up a bit. Although the LG1’s are not at all rare these days they still can make very nice players once a few things are addressed.
It’s also a pleasure for me to work on a project in which preserving the originality, for better or worse, was not the primary goal but upgrading the instrument to be a far better playing and sounding instrument than it was even when new is more important.
First the awful, “what were they ever thinking….” genuine, imitation pl*stic…. bridge needed to go…..
Although from a distance these things can fool the uninitiated in how these little guitar were made these plastic bridges had absolutely nothing going for them by any measure beyond, perhaps, ease of manufacture…. In addition the bridge on an acoustic guitar is actually one of the very most important “braces” on the guitar top and a plastic bridge just could not do the job required in this respect either. This guitar is ladder braced as many of the more recent LG1’s were and as such it was even more important to have a bridge that also served as a brace.
With this example we can also see that the finish in front of the bridge has been damaged long ago. Repairing the finish was not on my customer’s priority list but doing what it took to get a great playing and sounding guitar was very much on his list.
So…. step one was nixing the plastic bridge and making a shop-made, rosewood replacement.
We duplicated the hole spacing on the original plastic bridge so as to reuse the existing holes through the top and the bridge plate. In addition to replacing the bridges on these old LG1’s it’s par for the course so-to-speak to need to repair a cracked bridge plate too. In this case we elected to make a cap for the bridge plate in so much as this one was not cracked but somewhat worn from the string ball ends. The cap, made of osage orange in this case, was fabricated and glued in place. Sorry, no pics of this process as I simply forgot to get pics of the capping process….
The finish under where the new bridge would be glued was carefully removed exposing fresh wood for the gluing process.
It was time for a new batch of hot hide glue and once mixed up and heated to just below 145F the bridge, after being trial fitted and clamped, was pre-heated and then glued and clamped in place.
I like to cut my saddle slot on the guitar, this now includes newly built guitars too. This technique makes saddle placement less dependent on bridge placement and provides the opportunity to mill the slot in exactly the position that it needs to be based on the actual guitars scale, neck set, and bridge position.
I also forgot to take pics of the saddle milling process but you get the idea I am sure….
In addition to capping the bridge plate, making and installing a new bridge, reattaching the pick guard, we also were tasked with making a new bone nut and saddle.
I was taught to make my nuts on the actual guitar and to sacrifice a set of strings, often the crispy critters that these guitars arrive at my shop with…., in the nut making process.
Here is the roughed in nut on the guitar.
A new bone saddle was also crafted and this time the saddle was properly intonated based on what this guitar was asking for in the intonation department. This in an of itself is a big upgrade for an LG1, a bone nut and saddle will work in concert with the new rosewood bridge to hopefully produce some beautiful music for years to come.
Once all the upgrades were completed this little guitar can now sing sweetly once again AND with a proper set-up as well it plays like a dream too. The neck is pretty narrow on these and although I don’t have big hands it was narrow even for me. But the result was very rewarding and my client was very pleased with the results as well. The guitar sounds excellent, plays like butter, and is ready for decades of beautiful music making!
