New models to debut in Memphis

[Martin Keith]

Stuart,

Looking good - can't wait to see these in Memphis!

What's up with the trapezoidal 'grid' of holes in your workboard?
Inquiring minds want to know...

Cheers,
Martin

[Oxwood_Handmade]

Awesome, Stu! Very excited to see you on the forum and this arch top build! Looking forward to seeing you again in Memphis, buddy!

Brad

[StuartDay]

Originally Posted by Martin Keith

Stuart,

Looking good - can't wait to see these in Memphis!

What's up with the trapezoidal 'grid' of holes in your workboard?
Inquiring minds want to know...

Cheers,
Martin

thanks…. The grid of holes is just a downdraft table. Carving the tops and backs with the angle grinder is a dusty affair. the downdraft helps keep the air a little clearer. Actually the whole workbench you're looking at is a three sided pop-up "carving cage" I built so when I'm not carving I can fold it up and store it along a wall.

[StuartDay]

Originally Posted by Martin Keith

Stuart,

Looking good - can't wait to see these in Memphis!

What's up with the trapezoidal 'grid' of holes in your workboard?
Inquiring minds want to know...

Cheers,
Martin

Originally Posted by Oxwood_Handmade

Awesome, Stu! Very excited to see you on the forum and this arch top build! Looking forward to seeing you again in Memphis, buddy!

Brad

Thanks Brad, Yea I'm getting excited for memphis. even though its like 7 months away I'm already feeling the pressure! haha.

[Julian Gaffney]

Must be fairly cathartic to go after your top with a chainsaw grinder, I should try it!

...on second thought, that might backfire for a flat-top

Really nice work man, looking forward to seeing it take shape!

[LouieAtienza]

Originally Posted by StuartDay

Spent the day doing the rough carving of the tops and backs.
I use a chainsaw wheel on an angle grinder to remove 80% of the waste material. I then collect the shavings in a bag to be recycled.
This method was taught to me by Tom Ribbecke and it's how we carved all our guitars while I was working with Tom. It allows me to carve at an obviously faster pace while also retaining the tactile experience of carving which is extremely important with archtops. The tactile nature of carving provides me with a lot of information about the wood. This is the problem with CNC machines when it comes to archtop guitars. It removes the ability to read the wood as you carve.

I have to take a day off now because my dust collection needs a part and the next stage is very dusty. But from here, I will remove the chainsaw wheel and begin smoothing and shaping with abrasive discs. Once I have about 5% left I will switch to hand planes and scrapers. Then we move to the interior carve.








In this photo I've drawn out some lines to give you a visualization of what I'm seeing in my minds eye when I carve a cutaway top. The tricky bit is transitioning the concave scoop shapes on the top side of the cutaway with the more convex shape of the rest of the shoulder. I dont take this area down as far with the chainsaw… I shape most of it with a finer abrasive disc which allows me to get into tight areas with surprising dexterity.

Disclaimer - This carving method is dangerous. For any guitar makers that are seeing this and thinking they'd like to try it I'd have to strongly discourage that. I studied under a master luthier who used this method for years. So I feel very comfortable with it. But bad things can happen very quickly with this chainsaw tool.

Great work!

Stuart, I got reamed at the MIMF for using a modified circular saw blade on my angle grinder (which I also modified with speed control.) I do have a "Lancelot" wheel as well and they do great at hogging material. I do understand their view that there may be some youngsters out there that think this is a great idea. I'm a big fan of Sam Maloof, and the stuff he free-form cut on the band saw was ridiculous!

I did develop a jig that works great with a router and is a little bit less scary to use:

[IMG][/IMG]

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Trying to figure out what the hole configuration on the carving pics are for?!

[gchastine]

absolutely gorgeous! love the headstock inlay. When is the memphis show?
Greg

[nootis]

Originally Posted by gchastine

absolutely gorgeous! love the headstock inlay. When is the memphis show?
Greg

June 5-7, 2015. See the first thread in the Custom Section and then click on the link. Should be fun, and you are all so close by.

[StuartDay]

So, I know I promised to continue with the carving. But I got sidetracked with a neck injury. Wasn't feeling up to carving for the last 2 weeks. So I continued on the rims. Here are a few pictures of the rims together, kerfed and with side stiffeners.
I'll most likely get back to carving towards the end of this week.
Cheers

Here is the inner and outer layer of the cutaway side for the thinline guitar



Thinline rim taking shape


Kerfing in



Typically I dont use end wedges, or as some of us call them "apology strips" on my archtops. This means I have to take a little extra time getting the butt joint cleaned up and fit but its well worth it.


And heres the non-cutaway rim kerfed and with my new side stiffeners. I used to use solid ebony or wenge side stiffeners. But i'm really working very hard this year at evolving my designs to solve the current problems regarding wood sourcing, poorly managed forestry, and over consumption of some of the more exotic hardwoods…. This is my solution for side stiffeners. Black maple veneer laminated between two sides of quartered Old growth Doug fir. Gives me the vertical strength I need reinforce the sides while staying horizontally neutral, gives more surface area while weighing less and I think looks nice. I'm sure I'm not the first to do this but I was excited about it.

[StuartDay]

The exterior carving is now complete along with the hand cut F-holes.

This new model is inspired heavily on classic archtops and so I thought a classically inspired F-hole design would be fitting. Downside is these can't be bound, so in the future I'll have a more contemporary F-hole design to choose from if binding is requested, but I think this take on a classic will work nicely, unbound, as a standard feature. Plus it was fun leaving the router on the shelf and hand cutting these. Haven't hand cut a set of F-holes in years.

Tomorrow I start on the interior carving in-between finishing up some repair work.

[Rob C]

This is a very attractive guitar. I'm looking forward to watching it being built.

[Too Many Guitar]

Hey Stuart, really enjoying watching this from start to (anticipated) finish. Can't wait to see it in Memphis!!

[Guitarfish]

You know Mr. Day, I have never even played an archtop, but this thread has me wanting one.

Fascinating build. Anxious for the next progress report.

[Too Many Guitar]

Originally Posted by nootis

June 5-7, 2015. See the first thread in the Custom Section and then click on the link. Should be fun, and you are all so close by.

Nootis - take a look at www.MemphisGuitarFest.com

[StuartDay]

Ok, the carving process can get a little dusty. So I haven't been keeping my camera in the shop. The next updates are off my iphone and so the quality of the shots are down. I also slacked a bit in keeping you guys up with every process. But what I can say, building three archtops by memphis (yes, there is a third in the works that is not part of this build thread) has got me pretty busy.

So in any case, here's some new shots. Enjoy.

Here is the first of the tail pieces roughed out. starting to look like a guitar here!


And binding pickguards



I got tired of bending my frets by hand so I whipped up this fret bender in 10 minutes with about $4 worth of parts I had laying around. Probably not a permanent fixture but it will get me through this round of guitars for sure.


Graduating the interior starts with depth holes. These are drilled, using the exterior curvature as a reference, at a depth that is slightly thicker than the widest point of my graduations. Just helps start the graduation process evenly.


Graduation pretty much done here… sorry, the lighting isn't great, its difficult to see whats going on but you are looking at the interior. I'm done with the bulkier tools and have moved onto voicing the top with scraper and sander.




Here is the thin-line with the back on and the interior all shellacked. This guitar is gonna be killer. That back is really going to pop under a hand rubbed tobacco burst.