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I am looking for some help to determine the best way to proceed.
I have a spectacular coco back, but it will require a body length of 18" or less.
Very few of the plans I see will fit this dimension.
There is a 3/4 plan available, but would this be considered a childs guitar?
Many of the online plan sellers do not allow viewing of critical dimensions, including our own here.
Any reason I could not take an existing plan and shrink it until it fit my requirement?
With only a half dozen builds under my belt am I nuts to try and draw my own plan?
Any creative ways to add length to a back? width is easy.
Not really interested in a uke.
Any suggestions welcome,

Thanks
B

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My memory is so good, sometimes I remember things that never happened.

How about giving a size 5 a go?

Draw your own plan. It's fun and easy. Plans are just guidelines anyway, since the exact right plate thickness and brace height will be different depending on the specific pieces of wood you use.

As far as brace layout goes, if it looks normal, it will probably function like normal. Make sure the bridge has plenty of overlap with the lower legs of the X. I wrote my opinions on upper bout structure here, but they're by no means laws. The vast majority of guitars are built with what I'd consider poorly designed upper bouts, and still last a long time before needing neck resets.

The sad truth is that some people will consider it a child's guitar... but I'm not one of them Especially if you use a normal scale length like 25" on it.

I've got some really nice small cocobolo sets too, which I'm planning to use for more small classicals like this one, which is redwood and Honduran rosewood.

Nothing particularly hard about putting down your own plan or shrinking an existing one, I'm sure you could do it. Our smallest guitar, a parlour from lmi Martin 1-18 plan, is 19" long, but it's a 12 fret. If you were to extrapolate data from some other plans I'm sure you could cadge together a 14 fret parlour, the same way a 14 fret OM and 12 fret 000 are more or less the same lower bout but different uppers. And it would be awesome!

"Any creative ways to add length to a back? width is easy."

One way might be to do a "bevel" at the upper bout similar to what a viol has.
Wide purflings can also be used to gain some real estate. First glue on some sacrificial wood to the ends, which will be hidden when the rabbet is cut and purflings installed (also use wide linings in these areas to catch the edge of the main back wood).

The 14 fret 0 and 00 size guitars have bodies shorter (but wider) than the size 1 Martin. They can make fine sounding guitars.

Some makers squish the upper bout down even further, so if you have the width you could design a relatively large body that is wide but short.
Another possibility would be to build a different instrument with the wood. Every piece of wood doesn't have to become a guitar (heresy!).

I have built three parlor style guitar (I call them size 0 but I don't know if they exactly fit that definition) using the Scott Antes plans (two things to be aware of with these plans is that they are drawn as tho you were looking thru the back so its easy to make a lefty and many people feel they are over braced). The body of the guitars turn out to be 18-1/4, it would be very easy to shorten that slightly. I really like this size, they have a wonderful and very loud voice and a nice feature is that they fit in standard TKL cases (a big problem with a custom sized guitar can be finding a case)

Here are the latest two, Brazilian and Madagascar rosewood, Lutz spruce tops





http://www.lmii.com/products/kit-wizard ... cott-antes

The Antes plan is 18 3/8. They can be great guitars. I happen to have a plan handy that I don't really need anymore Brian. Let me know if you'd like it. I owe you.

This is going to you're hood. Interesting story I'll tell you sometime.

Cheers!

That Antes plan is actually about identical to a Size 2 Martin. And, yes, in comparison to an actual Size 2 Martin, it is way over-braced. I have a 1890 Size 2 Martin and the braces are about 2/3 the size of those on that plan. Of course, in 1890 they were still being braced for gut strings.

But it is really a sweet little guitar, and allowing for purfling, you should be able to sneak it out of 18" wood.

Grant

Thanks Steve, I considered that plan, but would like to utilize the 18" I have. I think the size 5 was only 16".

.
Thanks Danny, I think I will take you up on that. Sweet looking rosette!

Ed, Dennis, I will try and make my own plan at some point but I need to better understand the perils and pitfalls.

Looks like the Antes plan is good option.
Thanks all.

Now some eye candy

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My memory is so good, sometimes I remember things that never happened.

Cool! What is it? Do you have sides to go with it?

I probably have it, but PM me your address. I'll have it in the mail on tomorrow.

I am renovating a 1970's Taiwan Stella. Body is 18" long and 14" across the lower bout. Existing scale is a 12 fret 23" kids scale - but you could probably bump it to 24" with a 14 fret design. If you want - I can post some pix.

Thanks

Whatever u do with that set, reverse the back. Forget the sapwood.

Not a chance!

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My memory is so good, sometimes I remember things that never happened.

The sapwood is awesome, it makes the back!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

When I posted above, I was referring to Dennis K's picture.

I agree OP should keep sapwood.

Dennis, did u keep the sapwood or go for the figure?

Both the Antes 3/4 size (Martin Size 5) and the Small Concert (C. Bruno/Martin Size 2-ish ) would fit your set...the Small Parlor would need some minor work to reduce the body length from 18-1/4" to your set length. You could have a local copy store reduce the body plan portion of the Small Concert plan a few percent to bring it in at 18", try your hand at slightly reducing the lower bout length yourself, or build to the plan with a slightly wider back binding and purfling...you just need a scheme with a little over an 1/8" of width to get that 1/4" of length back.

One of the boss's Size 2's was in for check-up a few weeks ago, and seemed to me to be the ideal porch guitar, but Ed Sheeran, Aoife O'Donovan, and others do shows and record with their 0 sized or smaller guitars and seem to do just fine with them. The Size 5 is another guitar that this shop builds every so often - before I arrived, another student here built a curly anigre and Lutz spruce Size 5 intended for her niece, but elected to keep it for a few years because of it's flexibility and sheer 'fun to play' factor. Strung with medium gauge strings, the guitar can be played in standard E to E tuning, while strung with light gauge, can played as a Terz (strung G to G, or a minor third higher). In either tuning, the guitar can be strung with the octave strings from a 12 string set and played 'high strung' or Nashville tuned...PS - anyone with an idea of why either of those terms are used, please provide a citation...I've been looking for a couple days for a reference to plug into the design section of the notes!

One of the shop's Size 5's has been down to Nashville and out to Seattle for recording sessions, with the owner claiming the different chord voicings at G-G and high strung are more effective than double-tracking with a capo for providing a chiming, fuller sound, so definitely not an instrument to relegate to a child just because it is a little smaller in size.

In looking through the archives here. there have been several good discussions on the issues and fixes for the Antes 3/4 and Small Concert plans. From what I gather, both instruments benefit from building with 1/4" x 1/2" or slightly shorter bracing, the Small Concert needs a bit of a tweak on bridge plate & possibly where the X crosses top avoid an under-supported bridge, and both can be built with standard scales (the 3/4 by adding a 21st fret fret to standard Martin 25.34" scale board and then trimming at the third fret for the ~ 21-1/2" scale length the plans call for, and the Small Concert by minor adjustment of bridge plate and bracing). One post mentioned that the plans are drawn as if looking through the instrument versus the standard convention of viewing the top as it would sit on the bench for bracing. I checked both of our templates and saw that they had been drawn correctly.

There are some lovely photographs of instruments built from the 3/4 and Small Concert plans in the archives - I particularly like the Small Concert instruments by Dr. Kennedy, included in the links below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufy-irMK2AM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkFnb_1V0qA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0OfUCQ9aLA&feature=youtu.be

An all-mahogany Small Concert is on my list of interesting things to ponder - I already have a great set of lightly figured Cuban back and sides with matching top. Either size guitar looks like a great fit for smaller players and those with a few curves.

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A constellation only takes shape when one maps the whole.
- Beth Brower

I build a small parlor based on the C.Bruno plans that you can get online from various sources. It's body is 18.25in but you could easily shorten it to 18.

Ha Mike, I thought you might be one of those guys who just hates sapwood

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I haven't done anything with it yet.

By reverse, do you mean like this?

Or flip vertical and plane the sapwood off like this?

In building my first guitar I thought to use a image of a guitar I liked and scaled it to the size I wanted on my TV. Then I took parchment paper and traced out the size. In the end I never used the drawing but drew out my own design. Just put the sound hole and X braces where they would fit and the rest just fell into place.



I bought an old Stella birch guitar that I used the shape of to make some molds. It has a 24" scale and 18" - 13.5" body. Guitars sounds like crap but at least I got some use out of it copying the shape.

Dennis, with those sides I'd do it like your last picture with or without the sapwood. Nice set!

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

Yes. It helps seeing it both ways. Now that you did that, I'm torn. The little bit of sapwood is not a deal maker for me. And yes, I love sapwood. Reversed, it looks a bit busy. But, cut the other way, it might leave little figure. Maybe a template trace is in order. Both ways. Plus, u might find that a center strip might help.

What is being called "figure" seems to be just the slab sawn portion of the plate (not figure). I would try to get as much of that outside of the pattern as possible. I see this all the time...people calling wild, crazy, unstable, poorly sawn wood, "figure". And then folks wonder why their guitars crack Go figure.

Grant

Yeah, that Dr. K really has some throaty shimmer or something...wow!

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Pat