First amateur scratch guitar build, continued: cedar/mahogany medium jumbo

[Neil K Walk]

Ooooffffff!!!

I went down to take the go bars off and noticed that one had failed. That's not the worst of it though. The top left bout didn't glue down well at all, and the sound board actually split due to bad placement of the go bars.









The break looks clean enough to glue up - provided it can take the stress. If not then Imay have to reinforce or laminate it underneath somehow.

[Kitchen Guitars]

Oh! Ooops Heck we can fix it. Next week is a lighter load (so far). DO NOT KEEP refitting the wounded wood. You'll knock out fibers

[Neil K Walk]

I don't think that gluing the piece will be too much of a problem. I'm not touching it again until I have a plan, but I think there's too much overhang in that area and the shim shifted when an adjacent gobar was removed.

The real issue here should be apparent by looking close at the second image. If it's not, then here's the deal: there's an entire section of rim on either side of this break from the waist to just around the curve of the upper bout. I think it may be due in part to the fit between the upper transverse brace and that side brace that it mortises into. I did TWO dry runs with the go bar deck under tension and everything seemed to fit flush. Maybe the RH went up a little and things expanded? I don't know...

[Kitchen Guitars]

I Frog tape it in place to avoid or note shifting while putting on the pressure. Looks like it slipped out of the slot and the extra wood under pressure made for some dramatic photo's.
Heats on in the shop! Tomorrow night is ok. Monday night I think is ok.

[Neil K Walk]

Originally Posted by Kitchen Guitars

Oh! Ooops Heck we can fix it. Next week is a lighter load (so far). DO NOT KEEP refitting the wounded wood. You'll knock out fibers

You're gonna be mad then:



Fate or God or whatever you all may believe in has this thing about kicking me in the pants though. This time another gobar let go and shot right into the soundhole. Another inch in any direction and things could have been MUCH worse.



No apologies though. I will work through this. I already have some ideas. I'll need to do one of your little inlays though. I figure that it will be a small one since after everything is trimmed away only about 1/8" will be affected. That was probably part of the issue: too much overhang. In some places there's 3/4" overhang. As careful as I was any one of those cauls could have slipped for any reason. Next time I'm thinking of using clamps instead. It's easier - but costly.



My concern is actually with the fit of this mortise. This is what may be pushing everything upward. I may have to figure out a way to sand between those 2 surfaces to make it fit better. Odd that it did fit before but that's wood - it swells and contracts with changes in humidity and temperature.



There's also 4 consecutive points at waist that were not glued up either. Once I get that shored up I'll move on to putting some green tape on either side of that split brace and gluing it back down.

[Kitchen Guitars]

And that top snap was the reason birth of the fancy Cole Clark top inlay

[Neil K Walk]

OK, did a little more gentle poking and prodding and determined that yes that brace is the cuplrit. I need to somehow remove about 1/32" of material from it so that the UTB can sit flush.

I gotta tell you, I don't think I'm going to do things this way again.

[Mary]

Ouch. Hang in there and take your time, Neil. 'Tis true that occasionally guitar building can be much more complicated or frustrating than some make it look.

[Neil K Walk]

I took it over Kitchen's place last night and he looked it over. I don't know if he was messing with me but he told me, we can either shatter the top and start all over or we just glue the rest down.

Naturally I chose the latter.

On the ride over the box rode shotgun in the passenger seat. Yeah, I took it out of the mold. During the ride I listened to radio, laid my fingertips on the top and felt it vibrate to the music. It wants to be a guitar, so why quit now?

The issue was indeed that side brace/shim which was essentially getting in the way. I'd taken care of the worst of it here at home but he poked around and chipped away at a couple of places with a 1/4" chisel and it fits - albeit with a little "squeak."

So we shellacked the area around the break, tore it off by the thread it was hanging on, I wicked Titebond around the gaps in the glue joint and clamped it all down with cam clamps. Next time we'll glue that little piece back on and trim off the excess. I imagine it's going to look like such a small thing later on, though there will be a "scar" where I tried to repair it on my own.

[Mary]

Originally Posted by kwakatak

It wants to be a guitar, so why quit now?

...a "scar" ....

You are a good dad, Neil. Let's call this a character mark from the good dad.

[Neil K Walk]

Originally Posted by Mary

You are a good dad, Neil. Let's call this a character mark from the good dad.

Kinda OT but thanks, Mary. I like to think my heart's in the right place but I wish I could do more. With the kids I sometimes feel like the little red hen. Both my boys love to make noise with things but they're just not cautious enough around guitars - though we've got cute pics and videos of the little one with one of my guitars. I'm thinking that maybe I should build them a cajon or something though. I think both my kids would love to beat on one of those.

As for the guitar, I do rush things sometimes - particularly after difficult days when I feel like imposing my will on something that won't talk back or act out in frustration. It turns out the guitar can fight back too though!

[Mary]

Originally Posted by kwakatak

It turns out the guitar can fight back too though!

Yes, Sir. They have personality and be as argumentative as children. Maybe your next guitar can be a solid body to handle the kids rough days.

[Neil K Walk]

I went over to Kitchen's place last night to check on my guitar body and the chunk that came off the top. The glue seems to have held on the rims but the shard didn't affix itself to the main part of the top so I had to file all the hardened superglue off and try and get it to look seamless again.

John suggested I whittle away at the excess on the top with the router so that I could affix a bar clamp after glue-up but even though I was careful, I did chip out a spot elsewhere nearly as badly. Turns out that maybe I shouldve applied some shellac all over the top to reinforce the grain like we did when we routed out the rosette.

At this point it's moot because we put some more Titebond at each break and I taped it all up. I hope it held. After I clean up the excess glue I WILL be applying shellac.

Sorry no pictures. It's too ugly to look at and I'm trying to forget!

[Neil K Walk]

Tonight it was time to see how the (Titebond) glue job to those breaks came out. Off came the tape and this is how things look:



Just in case, there's also a break at the lower bout on the same side of the guitar as the break on the upper bout. It didn't split completely though so it wasn't as big of a deal to fix. I'm confident that it will be virtually invisible. The upper bout isn't as clean but I cleaned up the break as best I could so that there's a good glue joint and everything is solid. A check with a flashlight inside the guitar body showed no light leaks and there's no buzz or loss of sustain when the top is tapped.

Now that the glue was off, John handed me his Dremel and told me to use it to trim off the rest of the excess off the soundboard. He also told me which way to cut to avoid tearout. It was hard to see exactly where the bit was in relation to the sides from above so I had to kneel on the floor and look up from underneath. I also made various pilot cuts and worked VERY slowly!

So, on to fixing that broken brace:

I taped up around the brace and squeezed some Titebond into the gap, which runs from the end of the brace to the midpoint. I applied the go bars and cauls once again. There was good squeeze out which is a good sign.




BTW, that's my rosewood binding. I've been using it to eyeball my goof ups and see if I'd chipped away too much from the edges of the soundboard.

[naccoachbob]

So you turned a mishap into a feature!!
Any blood on that guitar? If there's no DNA, then it ain't yours.
Stephen Kinnaird told me that - and I've faithfully made sure there was DNA on all three that I've touched so far.
Keep going.
Bob