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Btw this is a repair I did on a Dimauro with the sort of break we are talking about. It had been repaired really, really poorly x2 when I got it. I did a pretty radical repair to remove as much of the broken material as possible. It obviously is not an invisible repair. There was basically no finish on the neck so nothing to cover it with.
Anyway I'm not really a repairman but this is mostly a demonstration of how bad these necks can break.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/pB5xqMD7mNMwUHJA9
Fun to hear the whole equation of tradition, cost and ease of manufacture, repairability, and aesthetics laid out. @Buco , I imagine what appears to be dark veneers under your machines add some strength? I assume that's the idea behind this veneer sandwich (ebony/walnut/ebony) on my own guitar, though in a different plane than yours. Obviously this isn't providing much clamping force on the weak point that might fail, but perhaps adding some sort of function in addition to the cool form.
Just decoration....since they don't continue into the neck joint they don't do a whole lot.
But they are important because, in my opinion, light colored headstocks look terrible. I formed that opinion after making one.
I always thought it was great you were able to bring that DiMauro back to life. The previous repairs seemed well thought out and executed by many of us here. But, I think yours finally did it. Now it is back in the wild...Far East as I recall?
@ethanwm yes that ebony looking veneer is just for looks.
Paul, I think you had a hindsight of a failed repair and what didn't work. Would you have done as drastic of a step to remove that much of neck wood without knowing the previous failures? Maybe you would. But it's a tricky call to tell the owner. Sort of "yeah I can fix this but I'm going to have to remove a huge chunk of the neck wood to make sure it stays put". The owner would probably have their eyes wide open in disbelief, "you have to do what...) I think repair people expect that the owners will expect a minimally invasive procedures that will do the job. Looking at the previous job, the guy probably had a know-how to do a drastic repair similar to yours.
Whichever it is, you saved that thing from a certain death gave it a new life.
Wait a second...at a first glance I thought you reposted a picture of my guitar...now I realized it's not. Is yours also Ivanovski? It has some sort of veneer between the neck and the fretboard? That's new to me...
It's hard for me to comment on the previous repair without being extremely critical but in a word, yes. Or I should say I would have (hopefully) repaired it in a way that it didn't break again in the first place.
It's a very common sort of break and the accepted ways of repairing it are pretty codified. I did something that was slightly radical but only because I needed to remove as much of that area as possible. But it's a very basic luthier thing. That's the only one I've ever done and I'm a little self conscious of how visible it was but the Gibson people usually have the benefit of paint to hide it. It was also a budget level vintage guitar so I didn't feel too guilty about it.
I wasn't bringing it up though to shit on the previous repair, just to say that one piece necks definitely break. In thinking it over yesterday, I think ones made of Mahogany and Mahoganish probably break more but there is a fundamental weakness of short grain there.
Just to point out that it's a sort of codified thing, here's some videos about Gibson neck breaks (all from the same luthier, who is great, but it points to how often this sort of thing happens). There are a bunch of different styles of doing this repair, lately people are using Carbon fiber overlays. It's because it's a very weak area (and that kind of goes for all guitars, this is a stress point) and making something that's maximally strong is difficult. BTW if you like learning about lutherie Ted Woodford is awesome. Very nuts and bolts and entertaining. He's very good.
Anyway, I was really not trying to bust on anybody. That repair was very, very bad. Not much I can say about it otherwise. Kinda like you have a big leak in your oil pan, someone covers it with gum, it still leaks, they put on more gum. It's hard for me to comment on it without saying wtf? But I've definitely done stupid stuff, we all learn somehow. I just try to follow who is doing the best work and figure out what they are doing. The nice thing about that guitar is it didn't have a truss rod so I could hog away at will. With Gibsons you have to make sure your router bit doesn't hit your truss rod because that would be pretty exciting.
Here's a carbon repair on a Gibson:
I am happy to STFU about that repair. But it just points to why I'm pretty serious about the neck joints that I choose to use...I don't want my guitars to break there.
@Buco Hah yes, a different guitar — made by Martin Tremblay in Montreal. There is a veneer or fillet (not familiar with the nomenclature, tbh) that continues the theme of the Selmer-y binding on the body onto the neck. A little visual interest given the fretboard's dotless, and headstock unsigned maybe? Rainbow rosette as well.
(Got it here a few years ago and had Martin refurbish it since he's close* by and had seen better days!)
I love and respect faithful Selmer copies, but I have a soft spot the little things people do to put a little seasoning on the old recipe. (The aforementioned luthiers' veneers, Gaffiero's heels...Craig's butternut and non-allergenic wood and wooden pickguards, Josh (and Craig's) removable necks, @paulmcevoy75's new bouche size, people making la table bombée rather than pliée without it being a compromise, Stringphonic's bracing tweaks, it's a long list. So... great stuff folks!)
@ethanwm ah, so you're not a frequent poster but a keen reader lol. You put that about the variety very nicely. Maybe you should hang out more often. What's that scribbling on the back of the headstock in the original Michael's listing?