I bought this tenor a while back and I unfortunately hadn't paid enough attention to the condition in the photos. It's got a lot wrong with it and I was hoping to get some opinions about the restoration.
On first glance it doesn't look absolutely terrible but it has a crack all the way through the center that goes up through the side of the fingerboard extension. There is a seperation of the top from the rim on the lower right so I wonder if it was dropped. It's also got a section of the backstrip pushed in.
All this has caused the top to sink at the bridge:
The action is high so it needs a neck reset as well as everything else.
My questions are:
Am i correct in thinking that these have a dowel neck joint?
Would it be better to remove the top or the back to attend to the internal issues and side seperation as the neck is coming off anyway?
With the amount of work this needs would it make sense to x-brace it? I know some of them were built that way and presumably it would help the sinking top.
The bridge isn't original but it is quite nicely made. Would a different design (thicker with a bone top as per the original) make much difference to the tone or volume?
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