Official Luthiers Forum!

Nice looking guitar Waddy, and nice new rosette. It will be nice to compare the sound next to the clip of #1. Bet #5 sounds great.

Tim

Wow, you are all so nice. Thanks so much. I have a friend who's going to play it today. I'll see what he says. He's pretty good. He did my first sound clip, and knows his way around a guitar. I'm hoping I can get him to do a clip on this one too.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Wow, just exquisite Waddy. The purflings and rosette really set it off, definitely worth the work.

Waddy that is one beautiful guitar!
Th finish looks fantastic as does the workmanship.

You better take amatuer off your personal info!

Mike

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Mike Collins

Thanks, Edward and Mike!

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Waddy, another success to add to the growing list of your triumphs. As you know, I like your approach to building very much, the care you take and the planning that you put into each step of the process should be a lesson to all.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Lovely!

Wow! That's awesome. I especially like your headstock, but all around you did a great job.

Mike

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Mike Lindstrom

Fantastic job, Waddy! I can't wait to hear how it sounds.

Thank you all! I appreciate your comments.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Waddy,

Just a question regarding the neck part:

I guess u probably apply glue to the inner wedge the one gluing to the heel block,
do you also glue the face of the wedge that is in contact with the top?
I was wondering if you dont glue that part of the wedge, it seems that the neck block has very little gluing area of contact with the top.

Sen

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Sen CL Goh
http://senguitar.blogspot.com

Sen, I don't consciously add glue to the wedge ends, but I'd bet they are glued to the top. It's hard to put wedges in and press in place without forcing glue squeeze-out into the bottom of the channel. What you have glued already would be the T shaped portion of the inside heel, which, IMO is enough to keep things stable. On this particular guitar, it was a smaller area than normal, because I had extra wide slots, due to salvaging a neck that I had cut the slots wrong in before. I had to make them wide to be able to use the neck with the V-joint already done. I still have one that I'll never be able to use. What a waste.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Waddy,

Another fantastic step in the process of your advance as a luthier. I wish it were possible for the pictures to convey the sound of the instruments.

As I said after the last one, I think your rosette, which I initially didn't like, has settled into maturity and is a real signature.

How is the 640mm scale? I haven't gone there yet.

In the voyage from #1 to #4, what do you feel are the biggest lessons you have learned?

Many thumbs up from here

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Thanks, Jim.

Fit & Finish are getting better. There are still many imperfections, but this one is better in that category. It has a couple of little shortcomings that are bugging me. One I didn't notice till last night C & C# sound a little muted. Just not as loud as the notes before and after them, on the second string @ 1st and 2nd, and third string at 5th & 6th or fourth string at 10 and 11, so it's the notes not the frets. I'm going to play around with the Sticky Tack and see what I can find. I noticed that if I touch the top just above the bridge near the binding on the bass side, it seems to open up. Maybe I need to stiffen that area a bit, or loosen something else. I think I'm getting another vibration that is damping those notes.

640 is fine. It's not really for me, as I have pretty big hands, but I just wanted to see what happens without changing anything except length of neck and bridge location. It does not seem to be an issue, unless that's causing the above.

I don't think there are any big lessons, just lots of little ones. Patience, may be a big one. When I get the bridge on, I get impatient to be done. I took my time finishing this one, and it paid off.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Please let us know about the results of any sticky tack experiments - I haven't tried that yet. So far, my complaints have been about one particular string. As I mentioned in another thread, as a steel string player, I am still struggling with the "man is that G string dead sounding" problem, and that has lead me so far to building some very light-topped guitars. I'm still waiting to transcend the "why doesn't this sound like a steel-string" problem, which of course only exists if your previous notion of what a guitar should sound like is your steel-stringed ones.

My one consolation so far in my time in Granada has been one luthier telling me that the G string on my guitar that I have with me sounds good. Minor (major?) triumph.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Waddy,

Thanks for the info.
I'll probably be trying for the wedge method on my next guitar.
The neck without the wedge in looks kind thin to me, but with the wedge in place it looks good.

For my #1, the resonance is around G# (main and body), so the top G# note 15th fret sounds abit short on the sustain.
So I kind of tried to change the resonance by using the bluetack (poster tack) to stick to the bridge area.
It did lower it to the F# note and the bass sound more even but some of the more magical notes (with lots of harmonics) previously, sounded not as nice as before.
The more even does sounds good, but well the treble becomes a kind of lack of character.
In the end, i decided to leave things as it is.

Sen

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Sen CL Goh
http://senguitar.blogspot.com

I was playing it tonight and it wasn't doing it any more. I don't know if it was a phase it was going through or what. I guess I'll just keep playing it and see if it grows out of it. Maybe it already has. It is changing every day I play it.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars