Official Luthiers Forum!

Can anyone tell me, show me, or direct me to how to bind the horn of a florentine cutaway? I've bent the sides (of black walnut), including the small curved portion of the cutaway. Now, I'm trying to figure out how to put the cutaway together and then, when the time comes, to bind it. I have seen people either choose to bind the point or not... I'm wondering how you bind the point? This is number 5 and the first florentine...

Steve,

On this one, I wanted to protect the edge of the soft mahogany with ebony binding. I cut the rabbets by hand. One edge of the binding overlaps the other, so the inside piece of binding is narrower and beveled where it meets the outer binding. Also, you need to anticipate the loss of binding for the beveling and chamfering to make sure you end up with widths consistent with the rest of the binding.

A few years ago Rod True posted a tute on how the cutaway goes together. Try a search on that.



Pat

_________________
formerly known around here as burbank
_________________

http://www.patfosterguitars.com

from what ive seen with the pointed Florentine cutaways, you put in a thick piece of kerf that fills the space of your horn. enough for you to route into both sides of the point for binding.

Thanks for the replies guys. Pat - You said you did the routing on the point by hand... I guess you'd have to because it would be too difficult to use a laminate trimmer... What tools do you use?

Personally I prefer not to bind the point but have the sides meet and match the grain.

_________________
Peter M.
Cornerstone Guitars
http://www.cornerstoneukes.com

Steve,

I cut it by hand, with a gramil, chisel and files. My binding router wouldn't work in this situation.

Pat

_________________
formerly known around here as burbank
_________________

http://www.patfosterguitars.com

That's a pretty interesting rim you've got going on there Chris. It that some kind of Harp Guitar or a double neck or something?

_________________
Bill Hodge


One does not simply, own enough guitars!

I just put the tip on a sander and create a flat spot to glue a block onto it. Sometimes I follow the sanding with a block plane. Then just sand the new block to the desired shape.
This is an oak side set with Manzanita binding.

_________________
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.

I dont do a true bound corner on florentines, ala mitred purfling but .... depending on the look I want, its either the same wood as the back and sides, or the same wood as the binding. Usually a coloured veneer strip is added to the bottom edge of the corner point, if I can call it that - the strip will be the same as the bottom line of the side purf, so that the point is framed in somewhat, but not totally mitred. Way easier to do than a fully bound/mitred joint, and looks just fine IMO.

_________________
Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

As others have mentioned , Glueing on a strip of binding to a flat spot you've created on the tip of the cutaway will work .
If you have a side purfling however , things become a tad tricky.
With the guitar below , I mitered the soundboard and back purfling and binding as per usual . I then cut a mitre on those ( at the Florentine tip ) for the three way mitre.

Using a shorter sacrificial piece of binding/purfling , I established the correct angle to suit this 3 way on my disk sander by trial and error . Once I had it correct , I had the angle locked in on my disk sander and then made that angle on my final Florentine biinding/purfling . It was a fair amount of fitting to get it just right so that the side purfling lines up . I repeated this same proceedure for the the heel edge

_________________
CRAIG LAWRENCE of AUSTRALIA
_____________________________________________

Woa, Craig, that's a fine piece of work!

Pat

_________________
formerly known around here as burbank
_________________

http://www.patfosterguitars.com

Thanks Pat , but in actual fact , it was a lot of futzing about . If it weren't for having a side purfling it would have been a snack. The binding does offer a degree of protection to that vulnerable end grain Florentine tip

_________________
CRAIG LAWRENCE of AUSTRALIA
_____________________________________________