Phoenix Guitar Co. Archtop Building Class Starting 1-9-16

[George Leach]

Hi Will,
The class is done in a couple of ways: My typical class is done on Saturdays--so people who work can take the class--obviously for folks local to the southern California area. This particular class is being done for a student who flew in for the class--so it's every day for 17-21 days.--the time depends on a couple of things-first, how quickly the student works, and how many features he's doing with the class--like in this case, we're doing a simple sunburst--and a floating pickup.

Let me know if you have other questions...Thanks

[George Leach]

Day 11 begins with Nick mixing some medium blonde shellac. While he's doing this, i'm mixing some amber shellac.


Nick is now taping off those areas of the neck that won't get any finish or color.


In the meantime, I'm taping off the body:


After taping off everything necessary, I'm blowing up a balloon into each of the f-holes, to block finish from getting into the body:


Time to spray. First, we're spraying a couple of coats of medium blonde shellac:


Nick also sprays medium blonde shellac onto the body:


Now, time for the color. This is what I call a "natural sunburst"--just a sunburst of amber shellac around the edges of the body and neck--pretty subtle. This is why the bindings and purflings were taped off:


Here's the neck:


Now, removing all the tape over bindings and purflings:


After checking the purflings, a little of the color has bled under the tape--this usually happens--so it gets scraped off with an x-acto knife.


Next, we spray a couple of coats of the medium blonde over everything, and that ends day 11.

[George Leach]

Day 12 begins--and we realize that we forgot to make a truss rod cover...Here, Nick has cut the cover out of a small piece of ebony, and is beveling the edges on the disc sander:


Now, we start spraying clear lacquer (water base KTM-9):


Nick will spray 5 coats on the sides and back, followed by 5 coats on the sides and top. We end up spraying double the coats on the sides (and neck), because since the sides are vertical (and the neck has lots of different angles), we spray lighter coats on the sides and neck, so the lacquer won't drip, and slightly heavier coats on the top and back:


After spraying, we end our day a little early, and go to a SIMSCAL (Stringed Instrument Makers of Southern California) meeting. On the agenda was discussing how to pick a good set of sitka spruce by flexing the wood and tapping:


Also on the agenda was a talk from Chris Herrod from LMI. Chris discussed the availability of numerous different kinds of woods--very interesting talk.

End of day 12.

[George Leach]

Day 13 is another day of sanding--trying to get the finish flat before we spray more coats:


More sanding....


Once the finish is nice and flat, we start putting on a few more coats. We won't get them all done tonight, but we get a couple done:


Here's the guitar back after one new coat...looking very good:

End of day 13.

[George Leach]

As we begin day 14, we continue spraying coats on the back and sides, followed by coats on the top and sides. In the meantime, we're going to work on the tailpiece as we're waiting for coats to dry. First, we roughly shape the tailpiece on a block of ebony about 1/4" thick:


Next, Nick uses a dremel tool to route away the section inside the white lines in the photo above:


Here's the tailpiece all routed out:


Now we glue our tailpiece "skeleton" into the recessed area. This piece is made of stainless steel, to easily handle the string tension, and allow us to ground the strings when we add electronics:


Nick is cutting out the center section of the tailpiece to add some styling to the design:


As we bring the day to an end, here's a look at the top with all coats on:


End of day 14.

As day 15 begins, we are spending the morning at the NAMM show in Anaheim. I ordered the case for Nick's guitar from Cedar Creek, and the case has been brought to the NAMM show by TKL (the makers of Cedar Creek cases).


Here are a few pretty interesting electric guitars....


Anyway, time for some business...at the Martin Guitar booth:


I wanted to meet my friend Dick Boak. Dick was the teacher (along with Bill Cumpiano) of the first guitar making class I took--back in 1992. Dick also was nice enough to endorse my book last year. I owe him one...


Finally, after a little more looking around, we stop at the TKL booth to pick up Nick's case:


Now-after lunch and a drive back to Torrance, we get back to work: Nick has a lot of sanding to do. Here, he's touching up the f-holes:


While he's sanding, I shape the pick guard, and glue on the foot-which will be screwed to the fingerboard overhang:


End of day 15.

[George Leach]

As we begin day 16, we still have a lot of sanding to do, to level the finish, and get ready for buffing. Nick continues to sand the body:


While he works on the body, I spend some time sanding the neck:


With the neck sanded out, and ready for buffing, I get ready to sand the fingerboard. First, I chalk it:


Now, I use a Stew-Mac sanding board to straighten the fingerboard, and re-sand the radius:


After the board is leveled, Nick pounds in the frets:


After the frets are in, he files the fret ends. Leveling and crowning will be done after the neck is glued onto the body:


In preparation for gluing on the neck, Nick uses a chisel to remove finish where the neck will touch the body:


Here's the neck. glued and clamped:


End of day 16.

[George Leach]

As day 17 begins, Nick is working on the tailpiece again, trying to get the final carving done:


While he's carving the tailpiece, I'm doing some sanding on the body:


After some sanding and buffing, it's starting to look pretty good:


Here's the final tailpiece, all sanded and buffed...


Now, Nick is working on the fret job. Here, he is marking the tops of each fret, prior to leveling the frets:


After leveling, Nick is crowning the fret tops with a Stew-Mac diamond fret crowning tool.

End of day 17

[George Leach]

As day 18 begins, Nick has finished crowning his frets, and now has taped off the fingerboard and is polishing the frets using micro mesh.


While he's working on frets, I'm doing some final sanding on the pick guard:


After sanding the pick guard to about 600 grit, I'm buffing it:


Next, sanding the bridge--followed by buffing:


In the meantime, Nick has put the nut into its slot, and is marking it with a half pencil to determine about where the top of the nut will be (actually about 1/32" above the line):


Now, Nick is sanding the top of the nut on the disc sander:


Now, filing to remove the sanding marks:


Here, Nick has measured out his string spacing on the nut, and is putting shallow string slots in the top of the nut:


We're getting ready to put strings on this thing....first the tailpiece gets put on:


Now, reaming out the tuning machine holes:


Starting to put on the strings:


After a little setup work, this guitar is sounding fantastic...


After the pick guard gets put on, it's looking pretty fantastic too...(at least that's my opinion)

End of day 18.

[George Leach]

As day 19 starts, Nick is filing the notch in the pick guard, which will hold the pickup.


After mounting the pickup onto the pick guard, we drill the hole to hold the output jack using a forester bit.


Now the hole is tapped so we can thread the output jack into the hole.


Here is Nick, testing out the pickup for the first time. The volume and tone controls are mounted on the underside of the pick guard, so nothing but the bridge touches the top. The guitar is very acoustic (especially for a 15" guitar), and the electronics sound amazing.


Now, Nick does some last minute sanding...


And last minute buffing...


Now for the official graduation photo: Really a great job done by Nick.


This was a great class...a few late nights--but Nick was a great student, and the results were terrific.

19 days start to finish....