1972 Martin D-18 Dreadnought Guitar

This nice old box was sent-in for consignment and it's actually in quite good shape. I had to replace the pickguard and saddle, but otherwise it's all-original. It was obviously babied -- but played. It sounds excellent and despite folks' often tepid response to '70s D-18s, this one sounds just as good as most of the '60s ones I've played -- and plays like one, too.

It has that clean, throaty, velvety Martin sound but with plenty of that "burred" chime and snap. It's also got good volume, too. There's plenty of "bluegrass" in it, but it also sounds like zillions of old folk, country, and rock recordings as well.

Repairs included: a neck reset, fret level/dress, replacement pickguard (original black one's in the case but it was peeling-up and curled at the edges), new compensated bone saddle, cleaning, and general setup.

Setup notes: it plays low and fast with 3/32" EA and 1/16" DGBE action at the 12th fret, strung with normal 54w-12 gauges. The neck gains only 1/64" of relief when tuned to pitch -- essentially bang-on straight, but I like to be thorough. Every Martin with the non-adjustable rod in the neck tends to do that.

Scale length: 25 3/8"

Nut width: 1 11/16"

String spacing at nut: 1 7/16"

String spacing at bridge: 2 3/16"

Body length: 20"

Lower bout width: 15 5/8"

Waist width: 10 3/4"

Upper bout width: 11 1/2"
Side depth at endpin: 4 7/8"

Top wood: solid spruce

Back/sides wood: solid mahogany

Bracing type: x-braced

Fretboard: rosewood

Bridge: rosewood, bone saddle

Neck feel: medium C/soft V shape, ~14" board radius

Condition notes: there's a patch of mucked-up finish on the back of the neck near frets 9/10 (pictured), a plugged jack hole at the endstrip, replacement pickguard, two little holes under the saddle where an old undersaddle element used to be, a few old-repaired (cleated) tight hairline cracks at the treble-waist-side (pictured down the post), and mild general usewear throughout. It's very clean, mostly, but does have a little pickwear near the fretboard extension and a few light scratches on the body.

It comes with: a newer TKL hard case.