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Just strung up #3, #4, and #5 and thought I’d post a few pictures. They are classicals as were my first two; still trying to get a few (maybe a lot) things right. Didn’t go far out of the box on anything with these three; am sticking with the basics for awhile. #3 is curly Spanish cedar with IRW head plate, fret board, bridge and binding. #4 is sycamore with ebony head plate and fret board, IRW binding and bridge. #5 is African mahogany with IRW head plate, fret board and bridge. The binding on #5 is bloodwood. The tops on all three are Engelmann, one of the necks is mahogany, and two are Spanish cedar, and I French polished all three (I have ordered an hvlp turbine). Got my back and side woods from RC Tonewoods (thanks, Bob). I was excited to try the sycamore, and really liked how the curly Spanish cedar looks under finish. Guess the only embellishment on these is use of piano key ivory on the tie block. Two of the rosettes were purchased on-line and simply inlaid. The rosette on the African mahogany build was composed of rather plain handmade tiles, and I used some bigger tiles (earlier rosette failure) on the tail block. Keep thinking I need to try a steel string so I can get some practice installing a truss rod and working with a bolt on neck, but think I’ll try a couple more classical guitars first since I’m set up for side bending with a heat blanket now. Still plenty of work to do on the fit and finish, but I’ve benefited tremendously from all the input and discussion provided in this forum. Thanks all.
Marty

Wow three great looking guitars. How different do they sound from each other. Great looking rosette on the mahogany guitar. I am going to string up a classical guitar tonight that I finished over the weekend but I think I will wait a bit to post having been outclasses with three at once.

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http://www.Harvestmoonguitars.com

Very nice trio. Can we make "Three Amigos" jokes now?
Looks like you have a plethora of guitars

Love that sycamore!

Do you even know what plethora means?

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Marty, nice job on the guitars! Which one's you favorite of the three and are there any big differences between them?

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Guys,
thanks for the positive comments. To answer a couple of questions, all three sound pretty much the same to me, and do sound pretty good IMO. Except for the back and side tonewoods being different (because I want to try as many as I can), they were all constructed the same way and weigh almost the same, except the Spanish cedar which is about 0.25 lbs lighter at 3.25 lbs. I do think it sounds slightly better, but I'm not a musician, unfortunately. I plan on comparing the three using Chladni's technique which I'm set up to do using SweepGen (thanks Trevor) and would like to compare spectrographic data as well (not ready for this yet). Visually I do like the syacamore, and it's comestically the best constructed of the three, but soundwise the Spanish cedar is slightly more appealing to me.

Am starting to work on#6 and #7 now (ambrosia maple and leopard wood). The rosettes are better than my initial try, and I'm using western red cedar and sitka spruce for tops. John, I saw the pictures of your blackwood guitar, and it's really beautiful, and noted that you are thinking of doing a cutaway on your next build. I'd like to try something like that too, but don't know if I'm ready yet.

As far as "three amigos" jokes, I thought Tony would chime in. And I am working on a plethora so that I've got Christmas presents for some of my guitar playing family and friends. Is there such a thing as a pod or gaggle of guitars?

Thanks again, Marty.

Si, El Guapo! It means a bunch of nice guitars!

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John Lewis
Wannabe builder owned by 2 crazy dachshunds