cracked nut

[Cary Fagan]

Hi,
I have an Epiphone MM-50 with a cracked nut. I had put heavier (j 74) strings on it, which didn't fit so well in the slots, and I don't know if they caused excess stress. It's my travel mando, perhaps not worth taking into the shop. I've never done any repair before but I'm interested. Is it possible for me to remove the old one and put on a new one? Anyone want to offer advice on how its done or where I can find out? Do I need special tools? Is it held by adhesive? Any advice on what nut to put on?
Thanks

[John Flynn]

You might want to try putting the nut back together with super glue. It is a very common procedure to fill in nut slots with super glue and plastic dust. For appearance, you can even sand the joint flush once it dries. If you get a good bond, it should hold forever. Especially on a beater, it should be worth trying. The worst that can happen is that you have to buy and fit a new nut. The nut should come loose with some light tapping. If not, apply a little heat and steam, before the tapping, although don't overdo that. You should re-glue it in with something like Titebond, so you can remove it again if you have to. Nuts are mostly held in place by string tension, so you don't need a tight glue bond for that.

[ShaneJ]

Oh....the Epiphone. Thank goodness!

[Bob DeVellis]

A teeny weeny drop of super glue can be used to reattach a nut. Super glue has very strong tensile strength but pretty weak shear strngth. That means that it's very hard to separate a glue super joint by pulling it apart but a sharp rap that causes the two pieces to move parallel to the bonding surface will break the glue joint. So, if you put just a tiny drop of super glue under the nut, it will tack it into place. But hitting the end ofthe nut should break the joint if you need to get it off. My only concern would be that you might lose some wood splinters from the point where the neck contacts the back of the nut. But if the area is prepped well and is clean and flat before gluing, I think you'll be okay. Others with more experience should please correct any of this if I've gotten it wrong.

[c3hammer]

Here are a couple of pages over at www.frets.com to get you going.

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Musician/GenSetup/Nuts/nuts1.html

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPa....on.html (http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Musician/GenSetup/NutAction/nutaction.html)

You can make your own pretty easily. All you need is a needle file set. The tiny round one for the wound strings and the rounded v shaped one for the wire corses.

The first will be a pain, but once you get it is should be well worth the effort to work on your own.

Cheers,
Pete

[Luthier Vandross]

Make sure you set the nut BEFORE glue.

Use one of those small tube extensions, flow the glue to about half a drop, then in a sweeping motion, go along the fingerboard/nut joint. Cappppilary action does the rest, very little clean-up.

Cold meds! Yuck!

M

[Cary Fagan]

Thanks for all the precise advice to you all! Much appreciated.