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so i recently decided i wanted to become a luthier as my career. started looking for a school in canada and found timeless instruments in tugaske saskatchewan. David freeman has been teaching courses there for 30 years almost and building for even longer.

anyway heres what i built during that 7 week course:

Its and Engleman spruce top, with koa back and sides. OM size body 25 1/4 scalelength. 1 11/16 nut width to fit my big hands.


engleman top


koa back


walnut neck cut and headstock glued on

heelblock rough shaped with bandsaw


unworked heel

chizeled roughwork

innitials on the foot (visible through the soundhole)

glueing headstock veneer

koa veneer on top of walnut neck

dry fitting rosette

outter ring bwb,bwb inner ring bwb,paua,bwb inner ring is same as outer

lol dno what to say about this one. like the photo though


goboard setup. gluing in back strip

laying out bracing on template
sides, binding and purfling bent

side bending press

getting into the fun stuff. the bracing and tantalones etc.


good shot of the scalloping i did to the bracing

already wanted to put strings on her

little early for strings

roping up the back

working on the butt strip




rosewood letters inside the koa strip with chevron purfling on the sides to match the back strip and purf.

drilled and inlayed

fine herringbone purfling on top of the engleman top

fingerboard soundhole decoration. taken up to 12k grit micro mesh, oiled and fretted

first cut shaping the neck

finished neck shape

french polishing stuff. shellac mix, methyl bottle and tampon

body before any finishing

first couple coats(of 15 total) looking shiny already

bridge template and ebony blank

finished bridge

cleaning off finish to glue bridge

glueing bridge

bridge glued

saddle shaped but not compensated. setting action and intonating was the next step

gohto tuners installed

back of headstock

ready for the trip back to ontario

class picture. im the big guy in white shirt with a beard.

Paul.
That was a most cool build photo story! Congratulation on your first build, which actually looks like a completed guitar.
Did the Rasta-guy build a brush?

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oh dont get me started on alani. and no that was just his clean up broom. he did make a protruding flower from his headstock about 3 inches around. he was this crazy homeless hippy guy who had gotten a government grant to take the course. he used to build harps back in the day. but man could that guy play guitar

and i cant believe when i strung it up it didnt break in half! lol

Nice job. Looks like a fun course. Congrats!

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George :-)

Nice build thread! Good looking guitar too!

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Looks like a nice guitar

I find it interesting that David Freeman taught you to build a steel-string guitar with a spanish heel. Did he give any reasons why he uses the spanish heel as compared to a bolt-on or a dovetail neck joint?

Christian

its more simplistic? not too sure as to why. the entire build was in a spanish style with all the roping used to glue top, back, binding purflings into place. i was surprised that was just about the only thing we didn't have a choice on was style of neck joint. it is a really simple way and seems like it would be really strong and have good sound conductivity through that big foot from the back. plus with a dovetail don't you have to have more of a block on the inside to route out the female part of the dovetail joint? so i guess its keeping the guitar lighter too. but i am new at this ill have to look into that more now you got me thinking why didnt we get a choice. that was just about the only thing we didnt have a choice on.

I think the main argument for using a bolt-on neck is the ease of doing future repair work, especially if it's a neck joint similar to the Taylor NT neck (see here:
http://www.frets.com/FretsPages/Luthier/Data/Guitar/Taylor/99NeckJoint/99joint.html)

If the neck breaks, gets warped over time because of the string tension,... and you have to replace or re-set the neck, it's just super easy with the bolt-on neck.

In terms of structural integrity or sound transmission, a well-executed bolt-on neck should be no worse than a dovetail neck or spanish heel (though you can get in some heated discussions about that).

Beautifull Paul, really is! What kind of wood did you use for the back/sides and headstock?

Dave

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koa back and sides. and thats a koa veneer leftover from the back on top of a walnut neck/headstock

and schmid im sure that is a good bottle of wine discussion as to which has the best sound transer. and don't scare me i never wanna have to reset this neck haha. thats one downfall i can see that being very hard to do, not to mention i would have to remove the back as well. guess ill have to look into doing some dovetails see how that goes on the next project

Nice work Paul.

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Bill Hodge


One does not simply, own enough guitars!