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Here's my homemade binding jig. the base of the whole thing is a piece of scrap countertop that i bought for $8. the bottom of the cradle are the offcuts from a mold i made from plywood.

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"...you have to get over your strict adherence to your largely imagined notion of absolute perfection..."

That sure is a cool jig. I would love to have something like that, but I would prefer to buy one instead of building It. Thanks for posting.



Your binding job turned out great. Where did you get the plans to make the jig from? I have a router but not a laminate trimmer. Unless i can find a way to use my big bulky router, It looks as If will will still have to take the gramil route. thanks

Ron

I dig my way through the top first because it doesn't chip off easily. You have to do it in layers, each as deep as you can score. After than the side material goes pretty quick because it splits along the grain and along the joint with the linings, so you can get longer strips at a time. If you try to start by chiselling from the side, you'd be cutting top and side material at the same time, and it would probably be more difficult than dealing with them separately.


You have an opposite definition of being a chicken than me. No high speed spinners getting anywhere near my beautiful soundbox!

Thanks. I didn't use plans. I looked at pictures and did it up freestyle. first I made the cradle. I used a completed OM guitar body to help me figure out how tall the cradle pieces needed to be, etc. I also considered I may someday make a Dread, so I made it adjustable to accommodate that. once the cradle was completed, I made the tower so that the thingy that holds the router would be at the right height to cut the binding channels, and so that it would "float" on springs.

If I can do it, you can do it. I only started woodworking at all in 2008, out of necessity (wanting to make a guitar, and having limited budget, and all).

Yeah, a router is quite big. I would recommend getting a laminate trimmer, though. I have used my porter cable for several things that I would not use a router for, such as cutting the saddle slot while the bridge was already on the guitar, etc.

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"...you have to get over your strict adherence to your largely imagined notion of absolute perfection..."

Hi Martin,
I have built a few simple jigs in the past such as a mold, bending pipe. plate jointer etc.., but I can't see myself making a binding jig like yours. I'm not too motivated to make certain kinds of jigs. I may get one from Blues Creek in the near future. I still would like to view some plans of the binding jig just out of curiosity.

I received the LMI gramil today so I tested it on a poplar board. It work out ok, but I know It will be different on the guitar because of the thinner more fragile wood and curves. But I got an idea of how It should be done. I probably try the real thing tomorrow once the binding is delivered. I seem to have more control of the chisel using it bevel side down.
I will be sure to let everyone knows how it turns out, good or bad. I may have a few more question before I get started

Thanks again to everyone for your help. Great thread.

Ron

I have a router and jig, which also work great, but still often use a gramil and chisel. If I figure the time involved in setup, it takes a little longer by hand but not much, and if everything is good and sharp, there is no reason that the results aren't equal to (or better than) what you can get with a router. And as has been pointed out, especially when you are just starting, everything happens WAY slower, which is usually a good thing.

Hi Chip,
Thanks for the words of encouragement.

What kind of jig are using? Is It similar to the ones posted.

Thanks,
Ron

Hey Ron, great thread you started.
I've been moving and don't have ANY time for much.
AAhhhhhhhhh!!!
Anyway, I use a Sloane cutter, which is similar to the gramil,
and I've found the best way to cut with it is to carefully scratch the first line,
go deeper, repeat.
What I do is keep going above the cut I've made for the next pass,
that way the blade won't wander with the grain,
but will end in the cut you previously made.
Kills my arthritic wrist, but pretty clean results.
Then I monkey pudge the waste with a chisel.
I need to buy another cutter, so I don't have to adjust for the side cut,
back and forth.
Keep that mo sharp!
Does your build have a radius top and back?

Hi Alan,
Yes, I think the back has a 25' radius. Could you clarify what you mean when you wrote "What I do is keep going above the cut I've made for the next pass, that way the blade won't wander with the grain,"

Are you saying that after you score the binding channel you adjust the gramil so that you can cut another line next to the the scored binding channel line? If so, I do that when using the LMI Schneider Rosette cutter and It makes removing the waste easier. Good tip.

Happy moving,
Ron

My wording was funky there.
What I do is start about 7 " from the tail of the guitar,
up on the lower bout,
then go from the waist, then upper bout, then from the neck.
Make sense? Score first lightly, then keep digging in more until it won't go any deeper.
It would be nice to have 3 of those tools, one for the top cut, one for the side, one for waste removal. Another tip is to make your
bindings smaller!
My latest one is .060" x 3/16".
I like the look!
Less waste to remove too.

Hi Alan,
I understand. Thanks for the tips.

Ron

Posting a few photos of my depth setting shims in response to a PM, since PMs don't allow photos, and they may be useful to others anyway.

First is my current assortment of shims. Score into plates for .08" binding, score into plates for binding + .06" purfling, and score into sides for .25" tall binding. Shims are made by repeatedly sanding and testing by cutting a short binding channel in scrap, until they fit just right. Fiddly work.


Second is the setup for scoring into the sides. Use the short, flat part of the body as the bearing surface against the plate, so rotation is locked (constant distance from tool body to blade), and impact of domed plates is minimized compared to using the long end of the body. The corners of the body can dent the top in this operation... I'm tempted to round mine over more to prevent that. Use the round side of the rod part, so it can navigate the waist. Also not really any harder to keep square to the sides on the convex curves than the flat side is, and getting the rotation off there doesn't affect anything but the score depth anyway.


Third is setting for scoring the binding thickness (without purfling) into the plates, while bearing against the side. Here I'm setting for the long, curved side of the body, and the flat side of the rod. You can swap it around to using the flat side of the body when outside of the concave waist area, but it's not entirely necessary. I do a pattern of 8 cuts, each starting from the wide point of the upper or lower bout where the grain switches, so I'm always cutting with the grain. Start with the flat side of the tool, and do all the convex cuts. They should meet up nicely at the centerline, since you don't have to reset the tool between them and risk micro-variations in the depth. Then reset the tool to the curved side to do the waist cuts. Start at the wide points again, with the blade sitting in the groove from the convex cuts so there is no possibility of not meeting up there. The two cuts going down into the waist (stopping when the grain direction changes) should again meet up precisely, since there is no tool resetting inbetween them.


And the last picture is just another shot of the third, after slipping the shim out. This cuts a ~.080" depth.

Thanks Dennis, those are very good tips!

-Ron

That jig is awesome! I want one.

Is it difficult? Well...sure it is. But so is doing a good router job. The great luthiers of history used something very much like a gramil. But there is every reason to believe they would have used routers and binding machines, if they'd had them. You could compromise as I have done: Use your gramil to score your intended binding channels. Then use your router to hog out up to your score mark. Just another option.

Good tip, Dennis, thanks!
I think I'll make a cutter similar to the Sloane, but with a longer guide, for the top and back cuts.
It would also have big handles.
Sloane's "Classic Guitar Building" book tells how to make a Sloane cutter.
They work.

Another advantage to the hand cutter over the router jig, for those of us with limited storage space and who aren't binding on a daily, weekly or even monthly basis, of course, is that the hand cutter .... is .... small.

Any opinions as to Sloane cutter v. Schneider gramil?

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If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason. - Jack Handey