1971 Martin D-18 Dreadnought Guitar

Overview: I'm irredeemably fond of '70s Martins because I've encountered so many people giving me guff about them in general. I think most of it has to do with folks not playing the guitars when they're at their best but having bad memories of playing ones that have fallen on hard times and so play and sound like little, hard-to-handle, cranky beasties. This beastie, however, is "road worn" but playing nicely and has just enough funk about it to make it a friendly creature to live with.

Tone: It's a D-18 -- it has punch and cut with warmth and a bit of velvet in the mids thrown-in. It's your grade-A, standard, bluegrassy sound. This one's a little rounder-sounding than most and not as aggressive so I'd perhaps consider this more for backup and fill work than as a straight, acoustic-jam, lead machine.

Feel: It's got a slimmer (front to back) neck than a '60s Martin but it's not much slimmer. It's still a medium C-shape with a shallow board radius.

Interesting features: There are two faux-pearl dots at the bridge wings. These concealed, at one point, the posts for some sort of piezo pickup. Said pickup is since removed but the dots remain. The saddle is a little wider due to the need to expand the slot to allow for a wider compensated saddle to improve intonation. A side-near-the-heel-mount strap button was added for someone who, presumably, used one of those skinny leather straps.

Repairs included: It's had a level/dress of the frets, cleaning, and a new bone saddle fit. It's playing spot-on quick and is ready to go.

• Weight: 4 lbs 8 oz
• Scale length: 25 3/8"
• Nut width: 1 11/16"
• Neck shape: medium C
• Board radius: 16"
• Body width: 15 5/8"
• Body depth: 4 7/8"
• Top wood: solid spruce
• Back & sides wood: solid mahogany
• Bracing type: x
• Bridge: rosewood
• Fretboard: rosewood
• Neck wood: mahogany
• Action height at 12th fret: 3/32” bass 1/16” treble (fast, spot-on)
• String gauges: 54w-12 lights
• Truss rod: non-adjustable
• Neck relief: straight
• Fret style: medium-lower

Condition notes: It has some stuff going on, of course. First-off, we had to expand the saddle slot to be able to get a wide-enough saddle in there to get proper compensation (Martin was keen on installing bridges 1/16" off target in the '60s and '70s) There are also the aforementioned dots in the bridge wings. There's a strap button added to the side near the heel. The finish, overall, has weather-checking here and there throughout. There's evidence of an old neck joint repair at the heel with some glue seep inside around the neckblock and overspray of the finish all around the joint area on the outside. It's clearcoat but has "cracked" in longish, curvy stuff on the sides directly butting the heel and on the back. The top of the guitar has one repaired hairline crack on the lower bout but the back has several old repairs to various hairline cracks, mostly clustered south of the heel area and then one shorter repaired crack near the endblock at the back. There's an old "dimpled-in" crack repair next to the endpin. The bridge pins and endpin are later replacements.

It comes with: It has its original old plastic Martin hard case.

Consignor tag: BBN