Hofner 486 parlor guitar restauration

Updated: Nov 25, 2022

This is a beatuful and rare old Hofner parlor guitar with the romantic name "486".

It is kind of a concert guitar body with an floating neck and bridge like an archtop guitar.

It was designed for steel strings though, but I guess you can also play it with nylon strings.

Anyway cosmeticly this one is in very nice condition without any bigger chips or damages. The neck is straigh and the frets still full.

I will adress two main issues here:

The back and sides a made out very nice flamed maple. The top is solid spruce.

The adjustable bridge is all the way down and the action still high, around 5mm at 12th fret.

The neck itself is pretty straight and will allow a low action.

The varnish has the typical cracks.

Also the pickguard is screwed dircelty onto the top on this model.

So I will try to used the same holes for the new pickguard.

The fancy binding around the neck pocket doenst make the job easier.

Since heat can easily damge it, I have to be careful.

A fret directly over the neck pocket is pulled out, so I can drill a little hole there into the neck pocket.

Into that I can push the heatstick and heat up the neck/body joint.

The neck is off.

Looks good to me.

Now the old glue has to be removed.

Here you can also easily see, that the top is solid wood.

With Hofner you never quite know...

Again mysterious marks.

The neck pocket is cleaned carefully.

And so is the neck piece.

I can put them together and lift the guitar off the ground, without any glue applied jet.

Then some fitting...

So I guess the fit should be still good enoght.

Also there is a little cloudiness from the heat on the neck part. Otherwise you cant tell it was off ever.

Now it is glued back on with Titebond hideglue.

I usually let the guitar rest for at least a week afterwards.

I new pickguard was made from acryl glas and screwed on into the holes.

The bridge is now almoast at maximum height. So there will be room to adjust in the futuer.

Some more little fittings and adjustments.

And Done.

I think often guitars are louder and more responisive after a neck reset.

But thats hard to compare and might be partly the new strings...

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