Custom carbonfiber wood hybrid - Page 9

PeterF · #**121** 10-10-2015, 11:42 AM

You don't need a polishing machine to get a good finish. You just need time, patience, several grits of sandpaper and some polishing compound, all of which can be bought for about £15 (well, the time and patience can't be bought

). Doing it by hand takes a long time, but certainly can be done.

littlesmith · #**122** 10-10-2015, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PeterF

You don't need a polishing machine to get a good finish. You just need time, patience, several grits of sandpaper and some polishing compound, all of which can be bought for about £15 (well, the time and patience can't be bought

). Doing it by hand takes a long time, but certainly can be done.

Thank you. I don`t have 15 euro. You could very well be right, and it could be doable with sandpaper in a couple of months per body, but i `m completely tapped out (+ in the hole with loans). But if i talk about it i get the pity party crap so i wont. 15 euro is alot of money to some people. There is only 1 shop here that sells up to 3000 grit, but it`s too far to walk, my vehicle is busted and no money to fix it (pity party alert).

Renting the cam and the gas and food and drink for the guitar players was around 150 euro. We will do another shoot soon, thats another 150 euro and thats the last of my money. That metal bridge fiasco cost me around 100 euro.

I do also doubt that 15 euro will get you a mirror shine on an aerospace epoxy matrix. This stuff is so rediculusly hard, it is not wood. They liturally make airplanes from this. The best thing to use for sanding composites is a random orbital sander, because it does not leave marks that you have to remove later. You need special equiptment for anything in the composites world, special composites polish, and you need to hit those RPM`s with a polish machine to make a difference like this movie (my aero stuff is much harder then this) :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDvmUsLtZ50

If your mold and vacuum is good, it will come out without holes and semi high gloss, that is a nice starting point for buffing with course, medium and fine wheels and special compounds for composites. That is what we are aiming for with this campaign, getting the funds to do every little job the correct way.

Also with prototype 3 the soundboard finish is intended like this, it is a theme guitar : laying in the desert for 40 years. I refinished it 5 times untill it had the antiquated look i was going for.

printer2 · #**123** 10-10-2015, 05:11 PM

Quote:

I have explained to you in great detail in post 118 why that request liturally impossible to make a perfect composites finish without resources.

Used to work in a test lab where we had to prepare samples to be broken or looked under a microscope. Some pieces needed to be brought to a mirror finish. Other than the last two polishes we prepared everything with sandpaper and elbow grease. About 1/4 of our work was composites for airplanes, one customer being Boeing. The stuff is not that hard. We also have people doing rework, and we had the best molds.

Maybe should have concentrated your limited funds and energy to one or two good builds rather than three. A metal bridge on an acoustic? Not sure if that one will sell much. You may have heart, but that only gets you so far. Put off the new shoot, sell pencils on a corner, do what you need to in order to get one guitar to look like a million bucks. Then use it for your promo. Until then you are just wasting your energies.

littlesmith · #**124** 10-10-2015, 05:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by printer2

Used to work in a test lab where we had to prepare samples to be broken or looked under a microscope. Some pieces needed to be brought to a mirror finish. Other than the last two polishes we prepared everything with sandpaper and elbow grease. About 1/4 of our work was composites for airplanes, one customer being Boeing. The stuff is not that hard.

Maybe should have concentrated your limited funds and energy to one or two good builds rather than three. A metal bridge on an acoustic? Not sure if that one will sell much. You may have heart, but that only gets you so far. Put off the new shoot, sell pencils on a corner, do what you need to in order to get one guitar to look like a million bucks. Then use it for your promo. Until then you are just wasting your energies.

yeah i agree, the metal bridge was not the right way to go. I wanted more finetuning possibilities at the time. But now i have changed my mind and think it`s better to have a fixed bridge that is 100% right. That shapper briedge had saddle that could go front and back, up and down, but then a ball in them for string spacing setting. That means if a potential customer needs to replace the strings he has to space the strings again, i think that is asking for trouble...

There was a cheap ebay bridge on there that rattled alot, then i found this bridge with locking saddles, i hoped it was the solution, it wasnt. The removal of the ebay bridge left so much damage that i had to glue this one.

I think making 2 instead of 3 guitars would be a good idea in retrospect. Then it would not all be so tight. I wanted to show alot with a little. I learned alot, and the best features of all 3 + the feedback of the guitar players resulted in the final model.

I have to ride it out now, the guitar players have already been filmed and a photographer has already shot the guitars, i will be recieving good images soon. If i could go back in time i would probably try to make them look nicer, or indeed at least 1. I can get tunnelvision about what i find important and what i don`t. I understand people are used to high quality finishes and this can take some adjusting. I wanted to show the total range of possibilities so that got my attention at the time. In the end it`s not really about showing alot of stuff since we are simplyfying everything now. Simple can be better sometimes. Another lesson learned. I`ll get there (eventually, hehe).

I can be very stubborn (i think people already knew that here) and i have to discover anything for myself. Somtimes i "discover" something and then it turns out my mom has been saying that already for 10 years. That same stubbornness has made me not quit over 10 years after the struggles so it can be a two edged sword sometimes.

rogthefrog · #**125** 10-11-2015, 10:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by littlesmith

The guitar thread that you showed looks amazing, and we both know that result is achieved with proper polishing, that means you have to own the machine, the weels and the compound. I don`t.

You don't need a machine to make a great-looking top. Many, many people do it by hand. I don't personally know the Thai luthier in the above thread, but he's described himself as poor.

Every post after this has been more reasons/excuses for why you can't do something. Successful entrepreneurs I support are the ones who spend their energies figuring out ways so they can.

But in a nutshell I feel you're putting the cart before the horse. You're trying to raise money for a production environment, at some scale, yet you haven't convincingly proved that you can build one the market will pay for. I see a lot of distraction / lack of focus and misdirection of limited funds away from what IMO should be your single focus: building one wood top CF guitar you're proud enough of to bring to your favorite players to try out (Paul Reed Smith and Steve Klein did that). One. Not 4-5 with odd bridge choices, not experimenting with distressed finishes, not two full-day video shoots with 5-6 people, or engraved plates, or marketing materials showing off 7 colors or finishes.

One guitar. The best you can make it, no excuses. Then try to market that thing and see if someone writes you a check for it. Then another, then scale up.

That's what a lot of non-traditional builders with limited resources have done. Limited resources are the mother of invention if you keep your eye on the one thing you're trying to do--build the best CF guitar you can.

Everything else follows (or not). But it certainly won't follow if you don't have one guitar built as well as you can imagine that you can show off.

littlesmith · #**126** 10-12-2015, 07:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rogthefrog

You don't need a machine to make a great-looking top. Many, many people do it by hand. I don't personally know the Thai luthier in the above thread, but he's described himself as poor.

Every post after this has been more reasons/excuses for why you can't do something. Successful entrepreneurs I support are the ones who spend their energies figuring out ways so they can.

But in a nutshell I feel you're putting the cart before the horse. You're trying to raise money for a production environment, at some scale, yet you haven't convincingly proved that you can build one the market will pay for. I see a lot of distraction / lack of focus and misdirection of limited funds away from what IMO should be your single focus: building one wood top CF guitar you're proud enough of to bring to your favorite players to try out (Paul Reed Smith and Steve Klein did that). One. Not 4-5 with odd bridge choices, not experimenting with distressed finishes, not two full-day video shoots with 5-6 people, or engraved plates, or marketing materials showing off 7 colors or finishes.

One guitar. The best you can make it, no excuses. Then try to market that thing and see if someone writes you a check for it. Then another, then scale up.

That's what a lot of non-traditional builders with limited resources have done. Limited resources are the mother of invention if you keep your eye on the one thing you're trying to do--build the best CF guitar you can.

Everything else follows (or not). But it certainly won't follow if you don't have one guitar built as well as you can imagine that you can show off.

Hi, i had an unexpected windfall from a family member of enough money to order colored carbon samples, as well as a new cedar soundboard and 3 rosettes that are the stock rosette of a model variation. The plan is to cut the soundboard into 3 sample plates. One with a normal cedar appearance, one with a blackwashed, and one with an antiquated blackwas finish.

All 3 will be finished as best as my means will allow, high gloss on nr 1 and 2, and matte on the distressed. I will follow all the correct steps and sanding grits up to 3000 and then try to buff it by hand as best as i can.

This way people can see that i am able to do a good finish. We will also combine the correct top sample with the colored carbon and the exact rosette to demonstrate what one of the models cosmetic varitations will look like with actual materials instead of a fotoshopped thing. We will take some new pictures with this or film it in a second weekend. Reshooting the guitar players is not an option so trying to refinish these guitars does not do much for the goal. The samples route is still not ideal, but this is what`s attainable right now. I am the first to admit that i did not choose the right thing always, i have a firm goal in mind, and a quality norm, i do what seems best to me at that time. Then you learn something new and you get new insights, But in restrospect making the right choice is easy. I focused 95% on construction, tone and playability and only 5% on appearance, that got a great sounding guitar. I might have underestimated how important people find a high gloss finish. I always thought that was an easy fix later down the road.

littlesmith · #**127** 11-02-2015, 11:00 AM

I have recieved the cedar wood and i have cut it into sample boards, i have all the right sandpaper all the way up to 2500 grit. I am doing every step correctly.

This is the new cedar sample plate with 1 coat of varnish.

This is the new cedar sample plate with 1 coat of blackwash.

This has 2 coats of blackwash (it will get a clearcoat as well)

They are both still a work in progress. Another nice thing that happened was that Mark Lettieri from Snarky puppy tested the prototypes and he liked them a lot, and then in the evening we could go to the concert for free, very nice guys and very talented. In my own opinion the best fusion band in the world right now, but that is subjective i suppose...

We are still editing the footage and working towards a launch date for the kickstarter. One year of work on this model is coming to an end and then we will see the response (or lack of). Launching the campaign is not the end of it, becasue you need to get as much people as possible to the website, throught your own URL. If you get 20% funded in the first week you get extra publicity or something, all i know is, you are battling an algoritm. If it all fails i will try to get a private investor with the footage from the guitar players.

Stay tuned,

Koen. ^_^

Minexploration · #**128** 11-02-2015, 07:18 PM

With the relaunch of ovation guitars, are these similar? Just asking because I was on their site and several of the ideas seamed the same. Ovation does have a bowl back but i believe they have carbon fiber... Some thoughts on the differences would be cool.

Scallywag · #**129** 11-02-2015, 08:07 PM

This thread is awesome. You are your own agent, my man. Build'em like you stole'em!

littlesmith · #**130** 11-03-2015, 10:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Minexploration

With the relaunch of ovation guitars, are these similar? Just asking because I was on their site and several of the ideas seamed the same. Ovation does have a bowl back but i believe they have carbon fiber... Some thoughts on the differences would be cool.

Hi,

I`m not sure if ovation uses or used carbon. They use fiberglass because it`s much cheaper and also a bowl from a sheet. That means they start with a flat plastic sheet that they mold to a shape with heat.

https://youtu.be/UWB22iSrD98?t=460

I am sparing no expense for tone, so i use carbon fiber with fiberglass in between in an epoxy matrix with an aero space rating on it. It is very expensive, but i gladly sacrifice profit if it increases dimensional stability.

Scallywag : Thank you, i`m trying. ^_^

littlesmith · #**131** 11-17-2015, 05:04 PM

After 1 year of preperation i am very pleased to announce :

littlesmith · #**132** 12-01-2015, 02:09 AM

After 1 year of work, the crowdfunding campaign for the Hybrid guitar is now LIVE!

http://igg.me/at/HybridGuitar/x/7621930

I hope you will like it!

littlesmith · #**133** 12-08-2015, 08:26 AM

The 10 original models are back and can be chosen on this crowdfunding campaign.

I would love to hear some feedback on the campaign --- > http://igg.me/at/HybridGuitar/x/7621930

littlesmith · #**134** 12-11-2015, 11:21 AM

Not all at once please!

printer2 · #**135** 12-11-2015, 09:26 PM

I took a quick look, well at least tried to you have a lot there. Thought you might start small and work on getting one thing right and build on that in the future. Taylor guitars would be hard pressed to deliver all that you are offering in a reasonable period of time. I must admit, don't know much about the crowd funding thing, maybe this is the norm. I really don't know what to say.