Chazmo said:
Martin guys would put this in a box and send it to Nazareth, get a new top installed and get a complete strip and refinish... Of course, we Guilders don't have that option...
This Martin guy wouldn't do that, Chazmo. You must not like Martians!
Secondly, it's a '71, not a '70, which means that the guitar is mis-marked in the auction. So much for the thrust of the auction that Brazilian RW was used in '70, eh?
Thirdly, if any of you guys are thinking about buying it, you're gonna need to budget a lot of money for repair. I'm not saying don't buy it, but do yourselves a favor and look at picture number 7. Please examine the fact that the top binding on both sides of the neck, is 'sucked in' very slightly towards the sound hole (by the way, if you look at where the back binding meets the neck in picture 10, you'll see a bit of this, plus a small separation of the heel binding and the back binding). Here, look at pic 7:
Now, look at pic 10. It's not as obvious, but if you zoom in you can see it better:
What does it mean? It means that the neck block has come loose from the sides and/or the inside of the top, which will lead to top cracks (the auction mentions three) and often-times, sound-hole warping.
Why does this happen? Well, sometimes, glue just lets go, but usually it means that the guitar got hot, the glue loosened and 150-200lbs. of string tension pulled the neck/neck block towards the bridge. When the glue gets cool again, it re-adheres in a slightly different place than was originally intended.
The fix is to loosen everything back up with a hot knife (thin, heated spatula), pull the neck and block back into the right place (as far as you can), then re-glue everything. A lot of times, there will be very thin cracks in the top right along one or both sides of the finger board. Typically, you have to 'shelve' those cracks with a long supporting clete that runs along side the top of the neck block.
Another little deal with the heat. If the binding that Guild used in the '50's, '60's and '70's gets hot, it's just a question of time until it starts crumbling; not 'if', but 'when'.
Anyway, that's my best guess.