Official Luthiers Forum!

Inspired by folks like Dave Stewart I recently finished my first archie. An offspring of the Benedetto book and DVD. It was probably the most excited I've been about a build in the 13 years I've been messing around with this stuff. I'm hooked and plan many more.





I laminated the Maple sides and used a bolt-on neck accessed by a long wrench through the endpin hole. I'm interested to see how that works over the long haul. Anyone here ever tried that on an archtop?





For more than you would ever want to know about the build pictures are here:

http://s252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38 ... ?start=all

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

Can't beat a good lookin' blonde!

It looks great Terence. Dave Stewart did a thread on bolt-on necks for archtops. It's somewhere in the tutorial section. Did you go with parallel or x braces?

Absolutely beautiful.
Clever neck adjustment, too!

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Looks great!! Love that vintage deep amber on archtops... very "big band". Is it on mahogany?? (..can't seem to view your photobucket spread worth a dang)
Glad to see you used the bolt-on (...maybe you saw my tutorial so long ago you thought you dreamt it ) It's pretty intuitive anyway and, I think, makes things just a whole lot easier, particularly finishing.
Great job! (you're hooked!)

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Dave
Milton, ON

Terry...it looks beautiful, as if you've been making them for years. I'd love to hear some sound clips.

Thanks for posting the build sequence...I plan to check out all of the details during leisure time!

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JJ
Napa, CA
http://www.DonohueGuitars.com

Sweet work Doc! And superbly creative photography.

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Bill Hodge


One does not simply, own enough guitars!

The top is X braced as the guy that talked me into building this thing wanted to play it acoustically a lot of the time. The back and sides are Maple, top is Sitka.

Dave I looked up your tutorial. Very nice! We did things pretty much the same. I think the Cumpiano attachment method with barrel nuts is almost mandatory because of the high neck angle. I found that some fiber/rubber plumbing washers served as good retaining washers to keep the bolts from falling into the guitar when the neck was off. I also ran my carbon bar reinforcement into the extension as you mentioned. Have your bolt-ons remained stable over time so far?

The finish is nitro by Addam Stark and he did a great job.

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

+1!!!

Wow, another great looking archtop. Excellent job Terry.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Very nice! The color is great Terence. I did bolt on necks for my last 3 archtops using a long wrench much like yours and hanger bolts. I don't think I'll ever go back to dovetails.

Nice Terence! It's great to hear you've gotten excited again. What's the router setup you used for the "f" holes? Collet? Flush trim bit? It looks like it works well!

Cheers,
Danny

I bought the LMI plexiglass template and clamped it to the back of the top and cut from the back with a flush trim bit with stacked bearings. Not ideal as the bearing didn't quite fit through the narrow part of the template and I had to do some hand work. I think I will rig up a pin router setup for the next. I actually did some experimenting with a pin router setup on my drill press with a 1/4" downcut bit but was not totally happy with the cutting at the lower RPM.

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

Hi Terrence. To answer your question, I've not seen any problems with the bolt-on over time. I typically do a pretty complete "tweek" after 2-3 months after things settle down, & at that point I check the bolts & may find another 1/4 turn needed.

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Dave
Milton, ON