Official Luthiers Forum!

In other words- What has been happening in your shop this week?

I have been making a lot of purfling strips- black .020 & .010, white (aspen) .020 & .010, maple .020, and radial zebra wood at .100. I laminated the zebras with bwb .010s on one side and bw .010s on the other- I used them with ebony binding, so no need for another black on that one side.



I also carved three bridges. I love ebony and I hate ebony. It took me about 6 hours from start to finish for all 3 bridges. And now I am very tired. Makes me start to consider making a duplicator....

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

This:

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https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100008907949110

"Norwegian polishing" the $100 classical...

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

So what's in the bottle? Reindeer oil?

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https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100008907949110

Yup, that's the secret ingredient...

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Putting the final coats of lacquer on a EIR/WRC OM and then waiting the very painful 3 weeks before I can get it ready to play.

Chuck

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"To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong"
- Joseph Chilton Pearce

The black is fiber sheets that I ordered from Uncle Bob at .010 and .020. The aspen I bought locally. I then resawed it and sanded it on a runner board (very slowly) through my thickness sander until it was the right thickness. I did the same with the maple. I then cut all the sheets into strips using my table saw and my fret saw blade. I clamped a piece of MDF to the fence to get as little gap under it as possible.

For the radial zebra, I had a 13" wide piece that I cut a 4" chunk off of. I then resawed that 13" x 4" piece into strips (around a 1/4" each). I glued up the new pieces to make 36" x4" pieces. Once those were set, I sanded them to thickness (or just a little thicker than needed) I then went over to the table saw and cut the strips just a little bit wider than the final width I wanted- in this case .100". I then sanded then them to exactly .100. Very time consuming, but worth the effort.

For those Zebras that I added the other purfs to, I simply glued on the outer lines and then rethicknessed to flush everything up- this is where that extra thickness comes in handy that I left in play earlier.

Radial stuff bends pretty easy when supported on the sides by other purfling. Without side support, it is a nightmare!

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

I built some workbenches over the weekend. Now I need to put a guitar on them. The shelf will double as my go-bar deck.

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Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from poor judgement.

I have level sanded my OM build and buffed the neck, I should have some pictures later today or tomorrow for sure. No wet sanding, 600, 1000 then 1500 Jost perf velcro 5" disks on a random orbit with Vac attached then menzerna coarse, medium then fine on a buffing wheel. I actually just retired my buffing arbor and purchased a Shop fox buffer, much nicer than what I was using.

Fred

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Fred Tellier
http://www.fetellierguitars.com
Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/FE-Tellier-Guitars/163451547003866

I'm finishing up binding and purfling on the Honduras Rosewood/Englemann OM. Now, on to the neck.

Chris.

Now that is purty! like the binding scheme and harmonious wood combo!

Joe

Getting #7 close to the end of the French polish process.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Just got done binding two OM's, one with nine miters. Scraping out the last one. The shop's a mess, my hands hurt, I've got a sore back, and my eyes won't focus.

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

Except for the messy shop, that's how I start every day!

Chris,

The radial zebra binding is very striking. I like that look a lot. Additionally, those ebony bridges look excellent.

Marc

OK, so I haven't played along on one of these in a looong time, so here goes. It's spray day at my place. Still no spray booth, so I'm shooting nitro outdoors and had perfect weather today!

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Wes McMillian
Santo, TX
http://www.wesmcmillian.com

And a little something I whipped together while waiting on nitro to dry. Still in the process of being filled and leveled.

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Wes McMillian
Santo, TX
http://www.wesmcmillian.com

Nice inlay. Looks like a Mc Million.

Just curious Chris what your idea is with those interesting looking pin-less bridges. Does their shape affect sound? I'm thinking of Tacoma guitars' claim that their specially shaped bridges help with tone or response. I've been wondering for a while how this works. It looks like they make it thicker on the bass side.

I've been winging it and attempting to build a case for my latest build, using whatever I have, including some pegboard (of all things), hoping it doesn't come out too heavy. Doah!

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

The original idea behind why I went with a pinless bridge was simply because I had changed strings so many times on cheap pinned bridges that required me to stick my arm in the sound hole to pop the pins out. The pinless design takes care of this problem. As far as how it affects the tone, I am not for certain. I would have to build one of my guitars with my normal bridge and then one with a pinned bridge and see if there is any recognizable difference. I have heard some talk about weight affecting tone. My bridges usually weigh about 50g. I have even had one closer to 75g. I do not have any problems with volume, sustain, etc. So, to answer your question- I don't know how much of an affect it really has.

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
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