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Showing results for tags 'crack'.
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I bought a very interesting violin at auction recently, about 100 years old. Really nicely made. Thing is, it has a soundpost crack (and several other top cracks). All the cracks are repaired very nicely. By that I mean, the cracks are perfectly level, no lips, and all are cleated on the inside. You can't even see the crack lines on the inside. The cleats appear to be pretty old. I'm basing that on the general amount of dirt and dust built up on them, the color of the wood the cleats are made from, and the color of the tiny bit of glue poking out from underneath a couple of them. It was still set up and under some tension when I got it in the mail, so presumably someone was playing it at some point. If I had to guess, I would say retail for this instrument, sold out of a shop, is somewhere around $5,000. My question is... Is it worth forking over the money for a soundpost patch or setting it up as is and seeing how it does? I can get a patch done locally for around $1,200 - $1,500. But I've seen a handful of old violins over the years with soundpost cracks and no patch, just glued and cleated, or even just glued, and being played on. Always seemed unbelievable to me, but they were holding just fine. What would you do? My plan with this violin is to play, hold onto it from some years, and then eventually sell it. -
I live in a country where we don't have any good luthier. Moreover, it's a hard deal to find a good violin, there's no music shop with normal violin (only cheap fake ones).. So I don't have any option except doing it myself. I will do it this way or another, but dunno the steps. Please don't judge me badly hahahah))) 1. As you see there are minor cracks. What material should I use to cover those cracks? Is it necessary to cover them? (pics of inside & outside below) https://imageshack.us/i/po9jreixj https://imageshack.us/i/plY0MBn1j https://imageshack.us/i/plH2Zi2Gj 2. Most of the cracks are on the ribs, but ribs are covered with additional ribs, so should I remove them, or it's okay to leave them this way? (pics of inside & outside below) https://imageshack.us/i/plSIOz4Bj https://imageshack.us/i/po33wiqAj 3. One more crack is on the neck. I think no need to do anything with it, still I took photo just in case.. (pics of inside & outside below) https://imageshack.us/i/pmXujnWtj I'm about to receive hide glue soon for it, so far, that's the only material I have for now. Now, one more important thing. When I fix them and put the spruce back I need to varnish it. I saw in few videos I found that the luthiers put coating, then they varnish the violins. Or I might be mistaken. Just need to know what materials to buy to varnish violin, how many layers of coating, how many layers of varnishing. Actually I'm not aiming to make the violin shiny, would like to make something like this (link in the comment). I hope you'll share your experience, please.... -
I never see this kind of cracks where the crack don´t exceed the perimeter of the purfling. How could I do to repair this kind of cracks? I have to break the purfling to let the wood go its way, or maybe it could be done in other way. thank you for your help.
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Hi people :-) I'm repairing a fairly old violin that I found in a local antique store. It's not very special, but it seems well built and I expect it to have a nice tone. Besides, I'm still learning. I've repaired a couple of violins before, but I don't want to work on anything too good yet. The top had two cracks. I glued the first one and it went quite well. The other one, however was more difficult. The wood had moved over time, so the crack was wide open and required quite bit of clamping to stay together in the right position. I set it to cure overnight, but one of the clamps must have gotten loose, because the crack is now open in the middle and perfectly closed in the sides. My question is: how do I remove the now hard hide glue in the crack that's preventing it from closing rather than holding it together? Will it be sufficient to heat up the area with a heat gun and reclamp it? would that daamage the wwood or the finish? I've tried scraping carefully with a knife, but it's not very effective, and I can't reach the "corners" where the crack goes from open to closed. I was also considering a damp brush, but I don't know if softening/removing the glue would take so much water I'd ruin the wood... Is there any good way to do this? And yes, I will be more careful next time with my clamping :-/
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Got a bow in for repair and re-hair from the local music shop. The wood of the bow I just discovered is cracked and the eyelet, which is slightly undersized has such thin walls that it does not hold when tensioning the bow hair. An new eyelet of the correct thread will not tread into the frog because the stem is also undersized by 0.2 mm. Easy enough (yes?) to drill out the frog to the right dimension for the new eyelet. A 7/64 drill bit worked well on a tes piece of ebony. But the width of the new eyelet needs to be filed down to fit the bow slow but at least 0.2 mm. Depth is OK so I can leave the height if the eyelet alone which is where the old eyelet failed. So my main question is is the bow crack an issue that needs to be addressed any other way that gluing with hide glue? Or would you use white glue? The store told me this was a $600 bow. I am reminded of the Pink Panther when Inspector Clouseau destroys this grand piano and the butler reminds him that is a "Priceless Steinway"... and Clouseau responds "Not any more"...
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I am curious about the devaluation caused by a couple of repairs. Removing a frog from a bow stick can be quite a delicate job, and those who do it incorrectly risk the eyelet catching the stick and chipping it. A repair I often see on bows is some sort of epoxy filler to cover up this common mistake. It is not the prettiest of fixes, so does it have any affect on bow value? Another common damage I see is that some bows have warped ferrules due to a tight spreader wedge. How severe is this damage? Also what would be the effect of a bushing to a valuation?
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On average, how many years does it take for a violin to crack?
mapfluke posted a topic in The Pegbox
So this may seem like an odd question but I am wondering how long it typically takes for a violin to crack. Without being locked in a climate-controlled box and just under regular conditions, will a violin eventually crack no matter what? I am asking because of the violin I had posted earlier that was sort-of-unsuccessfully dated has had no cracks and I am wondering (if this specified violin is 70-80 years old) if a violin that old is going to crack at any time or if the wood will resist cracking for many more years. Feel free to share instruments much older than mine that haven't cracked yet either or instruments that fell apart months after being made.
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Hello, I am repairing a violin front with a few cracks. And some of the wood on top of these cracks are missing (i.e. varnish side). However, the bottom wood still remains.I was thinking to use wood filler or cut away the wood to insert a new piece of spruce. Does anyone have any ideas? Thank you! Top (varnish side): https://postimg.org/image/5kr0x6nr5/ Bottom: https://postimg.org/image/mwrdimh8h/
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From the album: Sal Peralta photos
This is a break that I am trying to figure out how to repair. -
I would be interested in your opinions about the shape of 18th century instruments nowadays: How are the statistics to find an instrument without bass bar crack, soundpost crack and worm damage What I see at auctions and dealers is that the percentage of an 18th century instrument with one of the above mentioned is very high. What is your opinion regarding this topic?
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Hi there, I have a fixer-upper violin that I bought a while back. In the soundpost area, there seems to be a very small hairline crack developing. The crack doesnt go all the way through the top (from inside to outside). If you were to place the soundpost, it wouldnt be directly on the post, but a tiny bit to the side. Next to where the soundpost would be standing. My question is, do I need a full soundpost patch? I know it is hard without seeing the violin first hand, and posting pictures wouldnt help since you cant see the crack with the bare eye unless you were to bend the wood. Can you ever use a smaller soundpost patch, to make it more time/cost efficient? Fitting a smaller patch would be much easier than fitting a large patch. Thank you.
