Belated Happy New Year OFC!
I was fiddling around with my Celebrity iDea, and just got fed up with the high action and over all assembly quality and decided to disassemble her in preparation for a possible summer project. This "made in asia" guitar was not assembled particularly well and it needed a neck reset from the get go.



I love the idea behind the iDea, the design, the mp3 recorder, just attracted me from the beginning. My son first got his new, and despite having very close serial numbers the quality of our instruments were vastly different. Of course, I bought mine used and that would certainly be a consideration, but I've been wanting to do a neck reset on her since I first got her...

Several years back, when I first got the guitar I contacted Kaman to see if they could provide me with a schematic of the neck joint, but they couldn't. From inside the bowl, the joint looks unusual, and I didn't want to ruin the guitar, and I looked all over the web to see if there were any pictures or neck resets done by others to no avail.

So this is not really a thread about a project, but I just wanted to share pics of the joint just in case someone out there needed to do a neck reset on one of these iDeas. I've added comments that I thought might be helpful...

Unlike other Ovation neck joints I've encountered in the past, this one is NOT Lyrachord! It is just a wood block glued to the Lyrachord bowl. An attempt at cost cutting, weight reduction or both? Hmmm...

As is the case with all made in Asia Os that I've seen, this one has an enormous amount of adhesive build up. I wonder if that is one of the Hysol adhesives? This neck was a bear to remove requiring tons of heat, some boiled water, and lots of patience. My poly-bag method did not work at all! 

From this shot, I can tell that the sound board is solid spruce. That's been a bit confusing as the Ovation website says "laminated spruce" and the box that the guitar came in says "solid spruce." Well there you have it, "solid spruce." The cavity kind of looks like the Elite T style cavity, but the supporting block under the neck is much smaller requiring some adhesive under the tip of the fretboard.

Fortunately, the neck alignment on this one is straight...

Neck block material is assembled to keep the neck on the guitar. Not exactly clean but it gets the job done. I am definitely going to convert this one to a bolt-on!

You can tell from this shot that the bottom of the neck heel has the usual black plastic plate on it. Peeling some of the paint off showed a relatively nice looking mahogany (Nato) material for the neck...I think, I'm gonna go to school on Dan's 1617 neck re-finish and finish this neck with a natural color.

So, this dissassembly, if nothing else, has revealed to me that the materials used on the CC54i were pretty good. Even the sound board doesn't look all that bad from the inside of the bowl. To make this guitar a real performance guitar, I'd have to re-think the pseudo-Quintad bracing that is used and completely revamp the bracing, but that will be for another thread, perhaps in the summer. I hope this thread might be of some use for anybody that needs to consider or perform a neck reset on an iDea. I'll post more pics after I get the joints all cleaned up. I love the BFLG!

Chinese-assembly is all about cost-cutting. No one looks to China for quality.

Probably some sort of AMG. (Asian Mystery Glue) Since you don't know the composition of the glue, be very careful about grinding it. You don't know what sort of harsh chemicals will be in the dust.

And, a very thick solid spruce top, at that.

If the neck is only painted, then you'll probably be able to get away with simple hand-sanding. But, if it's got a thick coat of polyester resin, as did my 1617, you'll save a lot of time by using these Dremel buffs. (See: 511E EZ Lock Finishing Abrasive Buffs - 180 & 280 grit) I used the lighter colored one. (180-grit)

@ marenostrum: You're welcome! I always appreciate your interest and comments!
@ DanSavage & seesquare: Thanks for the helpful comments and suggestions...

So I was able to get the neck block and joint cleaned up. Like Dan said, this Asian O is not exactly the luthier's dream. No wonder why so many luthiers in Japan refuse to work on Celebritys. A little cleaning revealed some serious concerns. The first was the underside of the fret board. When the neck block was cut to accommodate the truss rod, they inadvertently cut into the fret board. There is also a deep groove running along each side of the neck block running parallel to the length of the neck. It looks like the neck block was too big, so they cut it down to size after installing it onto the fret board. These grooves and "cut" have weakened the fret board quite a bit. I may have to fill it with Hysol 9462 or replace the neck block altogether. The heel of the neck is a bit messy, but is in working order...

The joint cleaned up nicely too. I opted to heat and spatula the adhesive out of the joint. As Dan mentioned, it was kind of hard to tell what kind of toxicity the adhesive had, and I thought it might be safer to do it this way; however, I had second thoughts as I worked the glue off...the stuff just smelled horrible, but not like burning plastic, resin or polyurethane. It smelled like...poop! Really, nasty smelling stuff. Once it heated up it came off pretty clean and crumpled off.

The problem seems to be that this guitar was assembled with a lot of this glue and the glue itself seems to be designed into the "intended" structural integrity of the neck/body joint. Not a good idea...

The entire lower portion of the mortise joint is filled with glue. I dared not dig deeper as the whole neck support block might pop-off of the bowl. The next picture shows that the adhesive is used as a filler to hold the two wood blocks used to support the neck block too. I suspect one-day in the trunk of your car on a hot summer day, and this baby is going to need a neck reset...

However, inspecting the entire assembly shows that I can turn this into a fully bolt on neck without using any adhesives. That will make it easy to perform a neck reset if it ever becomes necessary. The only quid pro quo is that I'll have to extend the neck block supporting the fret board to the tip of the fret board, and make accomodations on the sound board to allow the extended neck block to fit on the body...

Of course, that is probably going to make the guitar much heavier in the final analysis...still, it is probably worth a shot. In addition, I thought I might change the bridge while I was at it. The original iDea bridge is much smaller than the 1868 bridge. They have equal depth, but have different breadth. The O enthusiast can tell them apart, but for what its worth, the iDea bridge is to the right and the 1868 bridge to the left.

It's also interesting that the iDea bridge uses no position marking pins. Another cost cutting measure no doubt. This 1868 bridge is a spare that I have sitting around. So, I'll be installing it on to the iDea. I'll have to move the bridge forward toward the neck on the guitar by about 1.5mm to ensure that proper intonation is maintained.

I think the iDea will look pretty good with the 1868 bridge. Since, I'm planning on swapping tops completely, I don't imagine I'll get to this until the summer, but I've decided to sand-off the paint to see what the solid spruce top looks like. If it looks pretty good, I might just keep the top, reconfigure the bracing on the sound board, add some bling, and put her back together. We'll see how it goes!

Thrilled to see all the great stuff going on at NAMM 2016! Thanks for all the OFC and FB posts. DW's publicist, Elizabeth's comment was so nice, and xraiderman's presentation of the 40th Anniversary Bear Claw Adamas was really something special! Of course, I couldn't keep my hands off of the CC54i Project after all this excitement; and so, I limited myself to 1 hour to see how far I can get...

Grabbed my trusty Black and Decker 7448 Sheet Sander, some goggles, a mask (ya gotta use a mask for sure!) and vacuum cleaner to see how far I can go...

For solid body electrics, I usually use heat or chemical removers, and the black polyurethane finish on my 1868 peeled off easily with heat, but this looked like some kind of special resin; and so I played it safe and went with my sander.

The "platinum" finish came off unevenly, and it was slow going and a bit worrisome; however, once I got down to the primer, the surface seemed to really level-off and the material began to come off more quickly and evenly. Fifty minutes into the sanding, I had gone through two 60-grit "one-third size" sanding sheets, and most of the "platinum" color was gone.

By "clean-up" time, the primer was thinning out nicely and evenly. You can't really tell from this pic, but the sound board is becoming quite visible and looks suprisingly good. As a matter of fact, it looks so good, that I'm seriously considering just keeping the existing sound board, and reconfiguring the bracing. As Dan mentioned, the sound board is quite a bit thicker than normal and I should be able to sand it down by .10 to .20 millimeters. Combined with a thinner finish, less restrictive bracing, and a properly assembled neck...this CC54i makeover should be quite thrilling!

Still debating what kind of finish to put on this one. Definitely going to give it some bling, but maybe black wash and black burst with natural maple bindings and black-gold-black purfling? Oh man, seeing all those 50th Anniversary Os just really makes the creativity run wild and $$$!

Removal of the finish came to a screeching halt a few days ago, when the mounting pad on my Black and Decker 7448 came loose in a big dramatic way (thankfully no harm came to the iDea). I've been using this thing for years and I figured it was time to invest in a new sander, but then I thought maybe Hysol 9462 would be able to handle this kind of load...wouldn't hurt to try...so, I broke out the powerful adhesive to glue the viberating sand paper mounting pad back onto the sander...

Now, holding a sound board onto a guitar is one thing, but holding a sandpaper mounting pad on a vibrating sander? "Naw, no way..." right? Well, I glued the pad back on, waited 48 hours, and do you know what? This Hysol stuff is monstrous! The pad is secure and I was able to continue without investing in a new tool! This stuff must be from Krypton or something...just unbelievable! Thanks for introducing this stuff to me Dan!

So what does an iDea guitar look like under the platinum finish? Well, nobody cares (lol), but I'm gonna share anyway - here it goes...

I was surprised. I knew the spruce top was solid, but I figured they would not be "book matched" or have knots, pits and other irregularities filled with wood filler, but this looks clean, with nice evenly spaced grains and apparently book-matched! The matched pieces of the sound board look to be glued properly and securely.

The sound board is apparently ungraded (not an A or AAA grade or anything like that), but over all it looks very nice. Unfortunately, there is one small edge of the sound board that was gouged and filled with some kind of glue. probably CA glue. I may be wrong, but I suspect that 20 years ago, this guitar would not have made if off of the production line. Defects like this would render the guitar a "2nd", "Refurb", or an outright reject - perhaps a reflection of Fxxxxr's quality control management philosophy.

However, in all honesty, I don't think my guitar repair abilities could do much better at making a new, clean sound board (hoping to attain Dan's level of expertise in the future, but that will be many projects down the road!); and so, I think I'm going to keep the top and go for the rebrace, refinish and reassemble strategy. She does look pretty good with the bridge in position...

I'm kind of getting excited about this iDea. Next step is to strip the neck down to bear wood...I wonder if I can make the headstock a slot head? I've always wanted a slot head, but there doesn't seem to be enough space. Well for now, what color? Natural, black, wine-red...to sunburst or to not Sunburst? Any thoughts?

Just a little bit more work and the disassembly will be completed! Very cool!

Hey guys, thanks so much for taking the time to comment! I really appreciate your input!

@Explorer - those Tangent guitars are cool, and if it ain't broke, don't mess with it!

@OMA - I saw the thread from back when you first bought your iDea guitar. I think I saw some pics on photobucket too. I am learning so much from this dissassembly, and the more I work on this guitar, the more I am convinced it can be a pretty great instrument

@Lonnie - I've made a bunch of photo shop renditions of a sunburst and just can't seem to get it right. WRT the gouge in the sound board, I think if I add binding and purfling, I'll be able to cover the gouge up nicely.

@tpa - I wish I were an artist capable of a semi transparent version of "Under the Wave Off Kanagawa" with matching headstock! I guess some kind of semi transparent iron-on might be the only way to pull that off!

DanSavage - 2016-01-29 3:51 AM

You're quickly becoming the go-to guy for Ovations in Asia. Pretty soon, all the luthiers who don't want to work on Os will be sending the work in your direction.

Be careful. It sounds like you're going to soon become a victim of your own success.
Dan

I've been studying the iDea's bracing pattern and was a bit bewildered by the size of the cross brace (blue) that spans the entire width of the sound board...why so big, why so thick? I haven't removed anything yet, but the more I look and feel the bracings of the iDea, the more I am convinced that they are made from pine. My Celebrity CC247 has spruce braces, but I'm almost sure that part of the cost cutting measures for the iDea included the exclusive use of pine bracings. It's not the first time, I've seen this in an Asian made guitar, but I never thought I'd find this in the iDea! Tragic...

The braces on the iDea are longer than the braces on the 1868; and so, I am going to shorten them up to match the length of the 1868. I also want to angle the vertical middle brace in the iDea to match the 1868. The 3-Oval sound hole on the iDea hinder the braces from extending past the neck joint, but I think the neck block will do an adequate job of keeping the top from bowing into the sound board at the neck joint. The iDea also has some thin pieces of wood glued under the bridge to act as a bridge plate, but I don't think those are necessary and will be removing them with the bracing. These changes should free up the sound board to achieve better resonance.

Because of the modern look of the iDea, I've decided to cut and shape bracings out of twill carbon fiber. I think Hysol 9462 will have no problems securing carbon fiber to spruce. Also, I'm going to try some 1mm thick carbon fiber sheet for binding and purfling... maybe with some abalone... I've also found a nice looking block of carbon fiber to fabricate a new bridge based on the 1868 bridge. A slothead is most likely out of the question, but a carbon fiber face plate on the head stock would be a nice match. Man, just seeing the photos of the Adamas electric at NAMM is just messing with my brains!

But in reality, the carbon fiber components should help to lighten the guitar. They should also provide rigidity that cannot be achieved by wood bracings. They'll contrast nicely with the clean spruce top and Lyrachord bowl. My plans are to highlight the grain of the top with light brown stain that progressively gets darker near the outside edges, and finish it all with a thin gloss shellac or polyurethane finish. Hmmm, this is getting interesting!

Thanks Jonmark Stone. I just gotta keep taking it slow to make sure I don't cause a major catastrophe!

Just as I suspected all the bracing on this iDea was made from pine. I started without gloves, but after getting some serious splinters, wisdom got the better of pain, and I put some gloves on...

Although pine is sharp and provides nice painful splinters, they aren't exactly suitable for bracing. A bit oily, heavy and flexible, they just are not the epitome of ethereal rigidity. So, that's why the cross brace on the iDea was so thick and large!

And removing the bracing was quite an undertaking. I used heat, and several different sized spatula's as I couldn't quite fit the Dremel tool in the space provided by the mid-depth bowl. It took a long time, but after I was done removing half of the bracing, I just couldn't take the punishment anymore, and decided to use some boiling water. I dipped the steel spatula's in boiling water, then heated them on the iron, and worked off the braces. Just a few drops of water made a huge difference and the remainder of the braces came off without much trouble...whew.

Under the sound board is quite a mess at the moment, but some fine chiseling and sanding will clean things up nicely. I did get too ambitious at one point and cut into the sound board (thankfully not a catastrophe), and this will need to be fixed before assembly. Perhaps some fiberglass and resin to fill the gaps.

In the final analysis, the carbon fiber bracing will be installed based on this photoshop mock-up. I'm still not sure how to deal with the area with the Oval sound holes interfering with the bracing. Probably, won't even need to bother with any bracing up in that area. The Adamas bracing includes a thin cross brace under the bridge, but I'm pretty sure I won't be needing that.

With the breathing room offered by the Quintad bracing, this iDea should find some serious resonance. So while I wait for materials to arrive, I can start working on the neck! Gotta slow down, slow down...

The cross going brace may have an influence on the top stability. The mode illustrated on the below picture will be restricted:

Besides affecting tonal characteristics I guess the also the tendency to bellybulge will be increased. But that doesn't mean that omitting it will be a bad solution. Especially since such stiffness is provided also by the saddle piece. It means that it will make some sense to prepare a cross going brace while you work on the other braces. This you can use as a guide for the other braces, and if You find that the guitar need it it can easily (to a person with your skills) be added.

I think you're right Cavalier. Not one to give-up so easily, I've outlined a basic bracing pattern based on the Quintad bracing with 3 main bracing pieces (in orange) and 3 tone braces (in green).

The bracing surface area is 34% lower to "soften-up" the rigidity of the CFRP braces and bridge (may need to route under the bridge in strategic areas to relieve it from it's "hyper" rigidity as well). The braces will be much shorter and thinner too. T2, T3 & T4 (un-marked) will be no more than 3mm in height, 2mm wide at the base and tapered to 1mm at the top. B2 & T1 are designed to jump over the bridge area to make sure the extreme rigidity is not killing resonance. It's going to be difficult to bring out the bass response in the guitar, so I'm leaving the bass area as clear as possible. Bracing will be added if necessary in the areas shaded in red.

Frankly, I have no idea how this will all sound, but the spruce top has a pretty sweet tap tone, and with some tweaking, I might be able to get this thing to sound half-way-decent. Even if it doesn't work out, I sure am learning a bunch! Great fun!

Hoping to avoid the sticky end, and there is still a long, long way to go, but materials are prepped and in order...

The CFRP bridge and braces are going to be especially challenging; but if I don't botch it up, the purfling and binding should work out pretty nicely. Maybe a fall 2016 completion. Gonna take it real slow...