Official Luthiers Forum!

Friends, don't look too close, I did a poor job with the appearance, but this is my new player. Meant to replace my 1960 ES175D - too valuable now to take out to the clubs. This one needs a knob for the volume and a cover for the truss rod.

It's has a spruce top, curly maple b/s, ebony fretboard. The finish is a rattle can special/satin to hide (most) mistakes.

It sounds and plays like butter.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Well if there's things you find poor about the appearance, there's sure a lot of good things too. Great burst and the volute look really nice. Glad to here it's so nice to play. Looks like a great rockabilly number............ or are you more of a jazz guy.

Congratulations on doing an archtop.

Cheers,
Danny

Nice job Steve.

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Kevin Mason
Mason Guitars and Ukuleles on Facebook
http://masonguitars.net

Hi Kevin, glad you like it! Yes, this is the one I started a looong time ago.

Thanks, Danny. I like to play everything just about, but this is a jazz box 100%.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Looks like a 100% jazz machine to me, and I think it's just fine! I'd love to wrap my inept little jazz fingers around it and see if I could coax out a nice ballad or two! I think you've made a very sweet axe! It's funny, but I built an archtop, too. It wasn't replacing anything so collectible as a vintage ES 175. But, what I find is that my hand made jazz box seldom leaves my house. I am utterly protective of it. I have a very sweet (but very durable) Epiphone fancy plywood jazz box that leaves the house with me on occasion. It's built like a tank, and I am not nearly so protective of it. Funny how we do these things, isn't it? You have made a real nice guitar. I like it.
Patrick

Nice job. I like the finish.

I am going to make an ES 175 pretty soon. I need to make the molds to press the plates but the rest should be pretty easy. I am not sure about the bracing though. Do you have any drawings or idea of their bracing?

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Ken

Looks great Steve. Don't you just love binding those F holes?

Thanks guys for the nice comments!

Darrel, yep, the f-holes were a real challenge for me - never again will I do that I tell you. But this guitar held a lot of challenges. For example, I messed up the neck joint and converted the dovetail to a bolt on. Tricky, but it works perfectly now.

Ken, this was made from the Benedetto drawings. You can make either sort of parallel or X bracing. I chose the parallel. I think 175 guitars have perfectly parallel braces, spaced apart to receive pickups and short transverse braces spanning the distance between the two longitudinal braces. From an acoustic standpoint, my guitar is a lot more interesting then my 175. Good luck!

Patrick, believe me, this one will go wherever I go! Say, just today I heard a guy banging out a bunch of Django lines on an Epiphone archtop - that was amazing - loud, punchy, and projecting. Just amazing. Not a second class guitar at all.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Looks delightful! Hope you have many happy gigs with it.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Steve, really great job on that!
AAAAAAAHHHH!!!
What more can I say?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Looks terrific Steve! I'm just finishing something very similar. Didn't you post another shot of this one in a previous thread??....caught my eye.

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Dave
Milton, ON

Yep, I posted a shot of the front in an archtop thread without the pickup. BTW, I believe it was one of your builds that inspired me to do the bolt on, if my memory is correct I owe you big time! Looking forward to seeing yours, Dave.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

It looks great, Steve. We need more archtops around here.

Does it have access to the neck joint?

Hey Steve, it looks great from down here in Texas!
That satin finish somehow makes it look already 50 years old...it looks friendly, played-in.
Should be mucho fun!

SK

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From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

Hugh, the bolts are accessible through the tailpiece. The plug assembly in the tailpiece is a one piece strap button and 1/4" jack for the pickup. When you remove the plug you can insert a (very long - 24") hex wrench and access the bolts. I didn't dream that up, I learned it here (I think from Dave S.) at the OLF. Really easy and effective and highly recommended.

Steve K: Thanks, means a lot coming from you! I actually thought of freezing it to make the finish crack, but I figure that is going to happen in time all by itself in an honest fashion.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

I've been waiting a long time to see this one. Congrats on getting it done! That's your first burst isn't it. Turned out very nice.

Steve

I hope you get to see it in person soon, Steve, thanks man!

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Fantastic job!

Well done! And yeah, just make sure you leave it in the trunk of your car a few times over the winter!

So I suppose you can insert the bolts through the F-hole, use tweezers to place it on the end of your long hex key, then insert it into the holes in the neck block that way?

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The member formerly known as erikbojerik....

The audience will never notice any blemishes. We are our own worst critics

Yep, that's it. Erik (& Hugh), I did a tutorial while back for an archtop bolt-on. (I expect this is what Steve refered to seeing)
viewtopic.php?f=10117&t=16049
Glad it's helpful.

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Dave
Milton, ON

Yes, Dave, that was the exact post. So, an enthustiastic and warm "Thank you" for the tutorial! (Not to mention the inspiration to try it in the first place.) Eric, I inserted the bolts through the pickup hole since it is so close to the neck block. I could get the bolts on the tool with my fingers.

Another helpful tool, if you are going to go this route is this jack fishing tool from LMI. http://www.lmii.com/CartTwo/thirdproducts.asp?CategoryName=Specialty+Tools&NameProdHeader=Jack+Fishing+Tool

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Beautiful guitar Steve. I'm going to be hitting you up for some archtop build pointers the next time we have a Chicago get together.

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Doug Mills
Chicago, Illinois