Used 1976 Martin D-28, front of the body

Used 1976 Martin D-28, front of the headstock

Used 1976 Martin D-28, back of the headstock

Used 1976 Martin D-28, front of the neck

Used 1976 Martin D-28, edge of the body from one side

Used 1976 Martin D-28, edge of the body from the other side

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the top and binding at the upper bout

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the top by the soundhole

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the bridge and pick wear on the top

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the top at the lower bout

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the top and binding on the treble side

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of the tuners at the back of the headstock

Used 1976 Martin D-28, close up of marks on the rosewood back

Used 1976 Martin D-28, second close up of the rosewood back and center strip

Used 1976 Martin D-28, standing behind its Martin hardshell case

Martin

1976 Martin D-28, Indian Rosewood, with Hardshell Case

Name: 1976 Martin D-28, Indian Rosewood, with Hardshell Case
Brand: Martin
Price: 2200.00 USD
Availability: InStock

$2,200.00

A 1976 Martin D-28, serial 379052, Indian rosewood back and sides under a spruce top, sold with its Martin hardshell case.

Condition 7, Good. How we grade

1 in stock

Pickup only, at 215 East Lewis Street in Livingston, by appointment. Contact

Thirty days from pickup to bring it back. Returns

Condition, in full

Top, and this is the mark that sets the grade. There is a split in the finish running along the centre seam, where the two halves of the top meet. It reads as a finish split rather than a separation of the wood, and we have not had a luthier put a glass on it. If that distinction matters to you, and on a D-28 it should, come and look at it before you decide.

Neck. It plays. The low E buzzes a little when the guitar is strummed hard, and not otherwise. We have NOT measured the neck angle or assessed whether a reset is due, and on a fifty year old dreadnought that is a real question rather than a formality.

Everything else. Frets have life. The tuners all turn. Finish carries the marks of a guitar that has been played rather than stored.

What is included

The guitar and its Martin hardshell case.

Service history

No work has been done on it by us. No repair history is known.

Why it is here

The D-28 is the guitar every other dreadnought is described against. Big, dry, loud in the low mids, and built to sit under a voice rather than in front of one. If you have heard a bluegrass record or a singer with a guitar on their knee, you have heard one.

Nineteen seventy-six is not the decade collectors romanticise, and that is exactly why this one is buyable. The seventies Martins get written off as a block, and then people play them and find a guitar that has had fifty years to open up. You are buying the sound without the premium that a serial number from another decade would add.

There is a split along the centre seam and we have not established whether the neck wants a reset. Both are written up above. A 1976 D-28 with a clean bill of health and paperwork is a more expensive guitar than this one, and it should be.

Pickup only. We are not shipping instruments yet, so this one is bought here: 215 East Lewis Street, third floor, Livingston, by appointment.

What it is for

Right for somebody who wants the dreadnought that defined the shape, and who would rather spend the money on the guitar than on the decade. Flatpicking, open chords, anything that wants volume and low end under a vocal.

Not right for somebody who needs a guitar with no open questions on it. Bring a luthier, or bring your own eyes and an hour.