Official Luthiers Forum!

Hey guys and gals. Just wondering, do any of you treat your jigs like your guitars? For instance, I am going to make a plate joining jig with the rope and wedges (if anyone has plans for this please let me know. if not, I am sure I can figure it out since its woodworking 101 ) and was thinking of using some nice walnut for the wedges. If so, please feel free to post some pictures...I cant remember drooling over a nice jig before.

LMII has a plate joining jig:

http://www.lmii.com/CartTwo/thirdproduc ... oining+Jig

I built a plate joining jig (not rope style) out of Baltic birch plywood and Sapele. I have two sharpening boxes (Brian Burns style) I built entirely with gorgeous Claro Walnut. Most of them are very good hardwoods with oil finishes. I figure the amount of time I spend building them and then being with them makes it worth feeling good about them afterwards. I love the feel of beautiful hardwoods in the shop.

I don't use a bunch of jigs, but I don't make any attempt to make them nice. I actually nail (and glue) plywood together for my body molds. There's nothing wrong with nice jigs, and I enjoy seeing pictures of them..............I just spend my time on other things. I'll try to post a picture of my plate joining jig later. It works great, and should be good for a laugh.

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I didn't mean to say it, but I meant what I said.
http://www.brackettinstruments.com/

If I'm really happy with how the jig turned out , I've been known to go as far as include an inlay ! ,,, but there again ,,, I'm quite mad ya know Here's just a couple

Binding jig



My 'Shoulder Holder guitar vise '





Of course I have many more , but must include my all time fave . My thickness callipers I made a few years ago.





Neat Jig,,,, neat result !

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CRAIG LAWRENCE of AUSTRALIA
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Great stuff, Craig!
That encourages me. Normally I'm very bad in putting more effort than necessary in a new tool or jig (and every time I pick up those jigs and tools I regret having been so lazy...)

No, at least not yet. Or do tools count too? I made my gramil out of a board of slightly flamed maple:

When I built my new caliper I did have a scrap of Coco laying around...

My Spanish neck/peghead joint jigs are simple but accurate and effective...

Nothing wrong with making a good quality and good looking jig or tool. That's a personal choice for sure.
Those are some nice looking stuff guys.

And the legend of "Lawrence of Australia" grows !!
Very pretty jigs Craig.Love your guitar holder.

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Anderson Guitars
Clearwater,Fl. 33755

http://www.luthierscooltools.com/Dwgs.htm

Luthierschooltools has a drawing of a spanish joining jig

John

On ya Dave. I've been giving my 'Shoulder Holder Vise ' a good workout of late and must say it performs sensationally.

As the name suggests ,it grips/hugs the instrument by it's shoulders ( edges/sides) and puts no pressure on the top or bottom plates. The clamps are able to move in a slight arc to match the radius of the instrument .Suitable for many different sized instruments ( not only guitar ), Clamp it to any bench you wish and when finished ,it stows away taking little space.

Here's a link which discusses it in more detail :
http://www.anzlf.com/viewtopic.php?t=1427

And a pic of it in action :

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CRAIG LAWRENCE of AUSTRALIA
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I would say worry about function first...then go for form if you feel you want/need to dress it up. Have to admit...some of those jigs are freakin' beautiful but would look so out of place in my shop.

-Matthew

Funtion is way more important than form. Having said that, I still like all of my work to be good. Can't help myself. Buy yourself a set of the Spanish Joining system (rope and wedges). I made mine out of poplar. In fact, I make a lot of jigs out of poplar since its normally the best wood the local Borg stocks.

For the glue-safe surfaces, I bought vinyl flooring strips with adhesive backing.

Note: I know to most it is obvious, but it was not to me. When using the Spanish Joining system, thickness the boards to 1/4" (or thicker if you like) before joining, then thin the whole slab down afterwards. My first attempt involved joining two top pieces at 0.12". Bad idea. I did that because I did not want to flip the slab on my 10-20 sander. Turns out it works just fine.

Mike