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I'm fairly new... But has anyone ever made or considered a 4 piece top if you have some decent cedar but not wide enough for a 2 piece? Basically adding 2" on each side to make up the difference.


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Multiple piece tops..ya sure, why not...they be a form of plywood, and we know a lot of guitar manufactures use ply in there products.

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You can take the offcuts from the waist, flip them over and swap sides, and that usually give a good grain match

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Torres made tops from more than two pieces, at times.

I think Romanillos does,also.

No prob. I would use some reinforcements though. If you are using cedar and just adding wings, be careful about your clamping pressure because the cedar will crush easily.

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Pat

Yea, we're talking about the edge of the lower bout which is already well supported and not in a critical area. I doubt reinforcement is necessary. When I restore badly damaged guitars such as 80 year old Stellas they do end up becoming a 6 piece top because they were already cracked in several places. They still sound fine.

I might do that to some builds just so I can get a jumbo out of a classical sized soundboard...

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Nope....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plywood

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John

Why not just move it down, that guarantees that the reflection will be the same.

If you just move it down, the curve that goes in at the waist would be pointing in, and it needs to be pointing out so you can use the flat edge for the join. If you filp it that way to take advantage of the shape, you also need to swap sides so the runout will be the same.

If you've got enough width to get what you need with a board match as you suggested, then taking advantage of the waist offcut being the right shape to extend the lower bout doesn't have any advantage.

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A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I always just shift down from the same side .. but with this method, or even the flip method, there is pretty much no way you are going to get a 2 inch piece .. the top will likely be too narrow in the upper bout to be able to do this. Usually you are doing this to add at most an inch ... if the OP needs two inches, and is talking 4 piece top, maybe he is simply going to use 4 slices from the same board, or something that matches up close enough.

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Tony Karol
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Thanks folks!! I would probably get the slices from the same board. And line grain up as best I can. The reason I asked is that I recently saw a 6x6 cedar that had awesome grain and thought it would be cool if I could use it for More than just brace wood!!
I'll probably give it a try!


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At first glance that seems like a reasonable assumption. Kim posted an experiment at the ANZLF that addresses this well.

http://www.anzlf.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3895

Great explanation! Thanks for the link!


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Um, yes John...
but
common John...lets not go gettin all technical on the old ?adma now.

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Multi-piece tops work fine and there is no need to reinforce the joints.

This one is a 5 piece top and if you are cutting the wood from a 5 x 5 (or a 4 x 4) it is possible just to "spread" the slices (rather than "open" them) so all the long grain run out is in the same direction. You should have plenty of scope for trimming pieces up to get the grain aligned so the the joins just about disappear.

It sounds fine for what it is.

Make the bracing out of spruce, though. it will be lighter/stiffer/stronger than cedar.

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Great thanks!


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