"Cornerless Italian & Spanish Basses"

[Ken Smith]

Originally Posted by Matthew Tucker

I'm interested to hear how Arnold approached stabilizing the burled maple ribs. They looked very fragile from the outside.

I don't think 'stabilizing' was an issue here. The two-part Ribs held up very well over its 200+ year old life. The thinner outer burled maple had cracked in several areas and with some blistering as well. A small piece or two around the sides were replaced. The inner Spruce layer was in very good condition as were the linings for the most part.

Arnold did point out one interesting thing here. The endpin hole was way off center. If measuring the long side, hole center to plate, then doubling that number comes to over 9" in depth. IF that were the case, then somewhere along the line before we were all born, the Rib depth of this Bass was cut down to its current depth. This is just a guess as we were not there back then and do not see enough evidence to certify that as fact.

Maybe Arnold will come up and explain in detail but I know he went around the Ribs working small areas at a time each day until it was all re-glued where ever necessary. I assume glue and clamps were used and maybe some non-stick material was used as a caul between the ribs and clamps for pressing any areas that were blistering. It looks very good now.

Maybe in 200 years it will need some more repairs so someone write this down so we don't forget how to when that time rolls around!