1972 Martin D-35 Dreadnought Guitar

This respectable old D-35 came in sounding... OK. '70s Martins often need a bit of finessing to get them to their potential. After this got a fret level/dress, a setup, a brace reglue, some nudging at the bridge (pinhole fill/redrill and string ramps), it turned from apathetic to full-on, however, and now belts it out impressively.

A D-35 is, at heart, a gussied-up D-28 and this one sports the usual 3-piece rosewood back and extra trim over a D-28 (fretboard binding and an extra layer at the edges). From the amount of '70s ones that have come in the shop for adjustments, they seem to have been pretty popular, too.

This guitar has been played hard. There are pick scratches near the soundhole, repaired hairline cracks near the pickguard, gouges on the fretboard from bad old fret-work, and several filled holes on the upper bout that apparently housed pickup knobs of various sorts.

The loose brace was one of the "tone bars" below the main x-bracing.

The saddle got better compensation and I added string ramps behind it to get better back angle to drive the top.

Pretty rosewood, huh?