Payar Ukulele Bridge Reglue

This cute little L. Luthier Payar Tenor Ukulele was bought used. One fine day, the bridge suddenly popped off, revealing a gnarly mess of dried glue and wood slivers. Obviously, this had happened before and one of the previous owners had attempted to repair the damage. The condition of this ukulele was very similar to the KAK Concert Ukulele I'd repaired earlier this year. I knew that I had to approach this repair very carefully so as not to damage the soundboard any further.

Cleaning the underside of of the bridge was relatively easy. However, cleaning and leveling the area underneath the bridge was another story. The dried glue had found its way right into the wood fibres and would not come off. I decided to use a heat gun to soften the stubborn glue before scraping it off. And yes, I should have been more careful with the heat gun as I ended up scorching the soundboard in a couple of places. Once the glue had been removed, wayward wood slivers were removed with chisels and the area concerned leveled with sandpaper.

With the soundboard sufficiently prepped, it was time to stain the rest of the soundboard with ColorTone Medium Brown (#5033). Following this, the entire body was sealed with a couple coats of Tru-Oil. Once the Tru-Oil had cured, the bridge was reglued to the soundboard using Titebond III, soundhole clamps; and wooden cauls. The clamps came off after four days, and dried glue squeeze-out carefully cleaned off. The ukulele was then strung with a fresh set of strings and tuned gCEA.

That's about it for this post. Thanks for dropping by. Stay home, stay safe, and God bless :)