Official Luthiers Forum!

What no ones doing anything? Not too much here, still fighting the dang flu bug. Started bracing #2 top and while waiting for the glue to dry got a little crazy with the body.

Glue drying


Soundport reinforcement


Soundport


Probably will clean up the shapes a bit more before I'm totally satisfied.

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Bobby Masten

Binding day! Mahogany / Lutz 00, Koa / Lutz ABG and adi / BRW dread.

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Its amazing how much faster a build goes when you can devote your full work day to it! This is my first commissioned build, lucky 13! Just now it occurred to me to name it "La Chanceuse" - The lucky one.

Got the binding made, installed, and cleaned up, soundport cut, fingerboard is shaped to a compound radius, 7.25"-0, made three bridges.

Monday I do the fretwork.

Lutz top, flamed maple body, Bocote binding, Ziricote fingerboard and bridge.

I've also got some old mahogany bent for a L-00, as well as a back and top, and I've got a neck made for it. First time installing a trussrod! I'll be picking away at this build, I need a steel string for all the thrashers to play instead of beating up my nylon string guitars.

A question. I'll be using some herringbone purfling on this one. Any suggestions about a binding scheme to set it off well? I've got more of the Bocote, which makes a nice tortoise shell kind of binding, but I'm afraid that it will blend with the mahogany too much.

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Expectation is the source of all misery; comparison the thief of joy.
http://redrivercanoe.ca/

I am putting the top on #4, a amazon rosewood, sitka spruce, OM , and working on #5 a 12 string, sapele and sitka spruce, with slight bear claw top... this is my first comission build for a friend...costing him one dollar plus wood!!!!!!

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MK5acoustics.com

Just got through slotting a stack of 650mm classical fretboards. (Shane's slotting blade). Binding a modified dread body that has been sitting around since I never finished Steve Steven's buildalong on Mario's site early last year.

I like this body, (it bonks really well) but there are geometry problems, the sides apparently weren't filling the mold well at the upper end, and the surface I have to fit the neck to isn't quite at right angles to the neck. I'm waiting until I get a neck mortising jig done before I go any further on this one. I'm going to try to build a two sided one that indexes both neck (on one side) and body (on the other) and can tilt the routing template surface to an arbitrary angle for either side. I may be wrong but I think Robbie O'Brien's is sort of like this? At any rate, I'm guessing that the neck heel cheeks are going to be different by something like 1.5 - 2 mm on each side, and I want to cut the mortise and tenon relative to a long alignment axis rather than perpendicular to any available surface.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Bindings in:

Nice miters at the tail, Doug, and that is one cool rosette David!
I managed to get the top joined and the first ring of the rosette installed on my Bubinga build.
The rosette center is Bubinga, flanked by Zipflex:


Click here for the Complete Bubinga Build Log

Finish work all this weekend...ugh.
Trying out some auto-type urethanes and it's a steep curve. One is a metal body resonator that's getting painted black as well as a solid body electric for my daughter. Her skin literally eats nitro so I was looking for something more durable. This stuff has been a bit of a challenge, especially doing the 'burst on her guitar. I'm not real happy with it but unlike nitro it's hard to put just a little of this stuff on at a time and the working time between coats is very limited so I'm going with it as-is.

The metal body needs a little more massaging of the primer, then it'll get it's basecoat, some clear, pinstriped and the rest of the clear. At this point I'm wishing I had the $$s built into it to just have it done, I hate learnin' new stuff.

Dis n' dat.

In my shop...a broken side. Put a damper on my day.

I am putting some finishing touches on a little retro guitar I built for a friend of a friend in town. These photos show it before the pickguard went on. I like it better without but I don't get to choose! It still looks good. Joe did the sunburst and did a great job as usual. I would love to be up to par in that department but it will require some practice(probably more like a lot of practice). The little guy sounds nice too, Mahogany and Red spruce, very lively and rich. I may have been playing it in the bathroom listening to it bounce around in there. Only maybe though.







David, the birdseye looks so nice, I am jealous of that guitar!

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Burton
http://www.legeytinstruments.com
Brookline, MA.

Finally got back in the shop to work on a replacement neck for a 12-string electric. Haven't been able to work on guitars for about a month. Gotta say the guy who owns this one has been real patient; nice guy.

Frets are cut and dressed with hemispherical ends but not pressed in yet.

I decided to use some small neodynium magnets to hold the truss rod cover and it works good. I'm happy with the result. You can just drop it close to where it goes and it self-aligns. Slide it sideways an 1/8" and its loose. Cool.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

# 11....made the rosette....got my sides bent...and plates joined...can't wait to get started in the morning!!!!

Fantastic, Filippo!

now that looks like fine shop. I finished my Jumbo koa body build, re-using the first neck I built from scratch
and took it to my friend Mike's house. It sounded very clear and I got many complements, though I find it a bit hard to play and I need to do some tweaking, especially on the upper frets. He gave me an old broken Washburn acoustic electric to fix. It's painted white and is solid mahogany. How do you reset a neck on these I wonder. You probably don't.

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"Preoccupation with an effect gives it power and enhances the error"
from "Your Owner's Manual" by Burt Hotchkiss.

THAT is looking really SWEET Fillipo .... very nice. I have some crotch walnut slabs that someday are destined to be doors on a cabinet similar to that kind of style ... raised legs and all.

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

NOTHING!
I've been virtually out of the shop since mid October when my wife fell and broke her ankle.
Surgery, a steel plate and seven screws later she is on an 8 week no weight bearing restriction while everything mends. So, I've been house-frau 24/7 since then. Next Monday (12-13) we get new xrays and the go-no go for return to walking. After that I may be able to start getting back to the shop on a limited basis to finish what was left on the bench when the accident occurred.

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Hank Mauel

NOTHING!
I've been virtually out of the shop since mid October when my wife fell and broke her ankle.
Surgery, a steel plate and seven screws later she is on an 8 week no weight bearing restriction while everything mends. So, I've been house-frau 24/7 since then. Next Monday (12-13) we get new xrays and the go-no go for return to walking. After that I may be able to start getting back to the shop on a limited basis to finish what was left on the bench when the accident occurred.

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Hank Mauel

Hey Hank, hope things are looking up for you and your wife soon.
My shop this weekend, well, I've been working a lot since May, so mostly I've been buying (WAS and TAS) and planning for my next build.
Ive got mostly what I need here or coming, but now have a heavy cold and so am avoiding the shop cos next step is routing out formers for side bending and mold pieces for an OLF SJ (basic shapes are already nearly done)
Be better if I can concentrate on what I'm doing.
Back to work next week, then building beginning of the year hopefully.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

jeff, i really like the design of that rosette. good taste.

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sweat the small stuff.

Thanks Keith.

often times, when i introduce myself, ill get someone calling me "keith" because heath isnt all that common of a name. but come on jeff, its wriiten right there on the page!

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sweat the small stuff.

I'm pretty busy, got two OM's going and starting a Mahogany/Sitka archtop. Just finished a size 2 for a nice lady.

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

I got my first rosette finished on my first build. I am starting lay out the bracing now