Gibson Les Paul Headstock Cracked Headstock And

This was a one owner guitar and I bought it from the original owners wife.

The conversion started with an original 1952 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop that had a headstock crack.

Gibson Les Paul Headstock Cracked Headstock And

I did a repair to the cracked headstock and I guarantee for life that the guitar will NOT crack at the repair.

The finish and all Woods to the guitar are original: (mahogany body, maple top, mahogany neck, Brazilian fingerboard, Holly headstock veneer, neck body bindings and fretboard inlays).

The previous owner had a small binding repair from the nut to the 3rd fret, (last pic).Original Parts Include: Strap buttons, Nut, truss rod cover, tuners, recut original pickguard, bracket, 52 switch harness, switch tip, backplates and trap end plate and all screws.

All conversion work was done by me: Jim Weyandt, owner of JamCity Guitars and comes with a COA.

I use UPS as my carrier and have never had any items damaged in shipping.

But our tone Gibson-fail Headstock-gate There is a very invested, and vocal, lobby of conservative Gibson fans.

Thats a bit flippant, but most instrument repairers will tell you that Gibson headstock breaks form the bulk of their neck repairs.

With a straight headstock, like the Fender-style, string-trees are one method used to increase the nut break angle.

Other instruments choose to angle the entire headstock back to accomplish this.

Its certainly effective but, depending on how the neck and headstock is constructed, it can introduce problems.

Gibson One-Piece Neck Construction.

This has been touted as a selling point the rational being that a single piece of timber will resonate as one and lead to better tone.

As luck would have it, that fault line occurs at what is already the thinnest and weakest part of the neck where the headstock leaves the neck.

The shorter section of grain here is much more susceptible to splitting or breaking apart.

What can builders do to prevent broken necks Im going to paraphrase something I read years ago (and I cant remember an attribution for it): Porsche designers decided to put the engine of the 911 over the rear axle and have spent the last fifty years trying to make a car defy physics because of that decision.

You could think of an angled headstock as almost a design flaw.

But its got something pretty great about it so, now we need to find a way to defy physics so it doesnt keep snapping off.

No one idea is the answer but there are ways to make the snapping, at least a little, less likely.

The Volute The easiest way to help things is to add some wood at that weakest point.

A volute is just a protrusion on the rear of the neck-headstock join.

This adds a little strength and, while its not a guarantee, can certainly help.

As of writing, though, they are beginning to introduce volutes on some models so, its possible well see more in the future.

Jointing and glueing a headstock on to the end of a neck makes for a considerably stronger neck.

Jointing a headstock on can be accomplished in a number of different ways but the theory is pretty much the same as illustrated.

No grain fault-lines exist and the end result is a strong neck.

Purists claim it wont resonate in the same way but, as with so many claims, Id really love to perform some properly blinded testing on this.

Again, the grain all goes in the same direction so its less likely to crack.

Not impossible, of course but, all things being equal, youll have fewer Fender headstock cracking than Gibson.

Gibson are not the only guitar manufacturer to make guitar necks like this.

If they announced, proudly, that they were going to scarf-joint all their headstocks, guitar nerds the world over would take to the forums and decry it.