1970 Gibson B-15 Guitar

Update 2022: I updated tiny parts of the decription.

The B-15 was right there near the bottom rungs of Gibson's ladder of guitars in the '60s. It's essentially a student instrument with ladder bracing, a comfy 24 3/4" scale, and the same fast, modern neck found on most '60s Gibsons. It sports a solid spruce top, laminate mahogany back, and solid mahogany sides. The neck is 3-piece construction with a truss rod and quite strong. Both the bridge and fretboard are rosewood.

I worked on this for a customer but much of the evident repairs were done in the past. This guitar has tons of wear and tear and much seam regluing done to it. Amazingly, only some of those cracks have cleats, so part of my job here was to cleat up and stabilize any cracks that weren't. I also gave the frets a light leveling and dressing and had to shave down the bridge a little over 1/8" to be able to then cut down the saddle and get good action height.

As typical for ladder braced guitars (especially strung over their life with 12s), the geometry had just shifted. After work, though, the guitar plays beautifully and has a very '30s/'40s flattop tone to it. It's a great bluesy fingerpicker or chunky chord-strummer. It's also a fair bit louder than the usual B-15s I've run into.

The look of this guitar is just full of worn-in honesty.

This has that late-60s/early-70s Gibson headstock shape that's a little more exaggerated than earlier ones.

Faux-pearl dots in a radiused board. The frets are medium which makes them easy to work on.

There's tons of pickwear all over.

This must've started life with an adjustable saddle. Someone installed an undersaddle pickup, though, and so this sheath for a new standard-style saddle had to be created to make use of the pickup element.

The finish crackle all over looks great and friendly. Though this looks like a 2-piece mahogany back, it's actually laminate.

Standard plate Klusons lighten up the headstock vs. the normal covered Klusons found on these guys for the most part. The volute at the back of the headstock suggests '70 or '71 manufacture, though the serialization places this at '68. I'm calling it a '70.

The river water is so clean today it just begs me to jump in -- and of course it's only clean on a cool day!