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#46
08-04-2013, 03:53 PM
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Ha Ha! I had taken the shape of the bridge patch from the LMI drawing, and made it before I had drawn in all the bracing pattern. My first comment was something similar to "Sheesh".
Oh and I did use sandpaper on the top. Here's a question for you and anyone else: I know that some people put finish or sealer on the inside parts of the guitar body. The one advantage to that that I can see is both sides having finish will be less prone to movement with changes in humidity. Now would be the time for me to do that before I put the back on. I was going to take this to you and Steve, but I know Healdsburg is coming up and I don't want to take any of your time. We'll have plenty of time after ya'll return. BTW, have a great time up there. I'd love to go just to see all the guitars and hear them, not to mention visiting LMI. My wallet is glad I'm staying home, even if I'm not. 
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#47
08-04-2013, 04:22 PM
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Well, there's plenty of different bracing philosophies out there. Many modified x-brace plans have the upper tone bar notched in the bridge plate - especially with smaller bodied guitars where there is a need to fit the braces in a smaller area. I doubt that having your plate notched will make much difference in sound, but that corner that's hanging out there could cause a stress riser under string tension. It would be easy now to fit a patch to the x-brace to fill that gap. The tension of the strings will be pulling the opposite way, but probably safe than sorry.
As far as finishing the insides, I think it's mainly to moderate humidity. My knowledge on the efficacy of this is small. We have not had internal bracing issues develop on our guitars without finish, but I will say as a repairman, I've never seen split finished braces. But that's probably because so few builders do it. I think the McKnights do it from time to time. Maybe they might have some input.
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#48
08-04-2013, 05:47 PM
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Ryan, you lost me there about a patch to the x brace and the stress riser. Could you go a bit further with it?
What if I took the other part of the rosewood plate and set it along side? I know that not being totally connected it wouldn't be as strong, but would it work to what you're saying? Thanks,
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#49
08-05-2013, 08:20 AM
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Quote:
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#50
08-05-2013, 09:36 AM
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usually people tuck a tone bar into that empty corner. were it mine i'd shave off the one closer to the bridge plate and make a new one to fit. patches are poor craft imo (unless repairing a crack or split.) and the glue is a movable hinge gaining you nothing in this instance.
regarding finishing the insides, haven't done it yet but on the next one i will (it'll be for me). i'll take to the kitchen and whip up some vernice bianca and have a go at it. something about strengthening the crystalline structure of the wood sounds interesting. a couple of things about finishing the inside of the guitar. 1.) keep the gluing area around the kerfing clear of finish -the glue won't stick too well to it and 2.) finishes usually raise the pitch of the box a bit. something to keep in mind. Last edited by arie; 08-05-2013 at 09:50 AM.
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#51
08-07-2013, 05:30 PM
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I closed the box Monday night by gluing the back onto the sides. Had to leave it until today because I was called to testify at a preliminary hearing on a child molestation case up in New Boston, Tx. My first time ever to testify in any court proceeding. So I drove up there last night, gave my stuff today and got to come home to the complete box.
I used a flush cutting bit in my Colt laminate trimmer to get rid of the excess top material so I could turn the body over and glue up the back, using the same mold and the colorful rubber bands. Then today I trimmed the back. On my first guitar build, I made the mistake of using almost the entire length of the bit to just trim the back. Because of everything not being totally square, there was some cutting and slight indentation on the sides that shouldn't have occurred. Every time since, I've made sure to just leave enough blade to cover the plate. Thought I'd mention that for other new folks like me - let me make the mistakes for you. I'm good at it!  I'm itching to bend the binding and the rest of the purfling, but I'm going to wait until the weekend so I can bend it and install it. Bob
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#52
08-07-2013, 09:06 PM
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Hi Bob,
You're really flying along now man! I've just finished my dread and have really been enjoying it. Playing time has started replacing building time! Regarding the bridge plate, I built using the same plan. I assumed that the theory behind that space between the plate and the tonebars was that the tonebars vibrated independently of the X, and that separation allowed them to better do so. I also have the LMI OM plan and it has the same gap. I assumed they were renderings of vintage Martins? Anyhow, don't sweat it too much, something to ponder for next time. Looking forward to seeing some binding on there.
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#54
08-08-2013, 04:43 PM
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Arie, I put it on the back burner and didn't do anything with it.
If there's a failure at that location, I will have learned an expensive lesson. I did not tuck the bridge plate into the X-braces, so I'm not sure that that small of a triangle will matter too much. It does leave a "point" at it's edge, but the other corner has a sharp edge as well. The patch itself is larger than what the plans call for, but that was in response to how light the top is. I'm hoping they cancel each other out. Oh, and I didn't finish the inside. I completely forgot. I guess that testifying had me more shook than I thought. Edit: Since this is only 2 pics, I'll add the fretboard inlay into this post. Here's the before:  And after:  I got it down to 400 grit, sometime while the finish is sitting on the box, I will use micro mesh and see if I can make it shine better. Last edited by naccoachbob; 08-09-2013 at 05:53 PM.
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#55
08-17-2013, 10:17 PM
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After a week of fooling around trying to decide what to do for the tail wedge, I spent last night and today working on it. I had to order a jeweler's saw to make this one, and it finally got here yesterday.
I had one piece of gold mop left over from inlaying the fretboard, and cut a 1/8" x 1" piece.  I then cut a pocket on a small strip of ebony to receive the mop.   I had earlier cut the tail wedge shape into some cocobolo to match the binding, and drew in the ebony/mop inlay location.  The ebony and cocobolo were the same thickness, so I used a couple of passes around the rim of where the ebony would sit.  A little fine tuning and they all came together. I guess I hadn't thought all the way thru this, but the coco and the ebony are both pretty dark. I'm just hoping after putting on finish that the ebony will show up well. I wanted to set the mop in the center, but if I want to put a strap on this guitar, it might have been destroyed by the hole for the pin.  Next I applied the bwb purfling to either side of the wedge with some CA.  Routed out the channel for the wedge, and glued it in with white glue.   Tomorrow I hope to start routing for the binding and purfling channels. And I have a question - If I want to miter the purfling at the wedge with that of the horizontal purfling below the binding, what's the best way to go at that? Thanks for looking. Last edited by naccoachbob; 08-17-2013 at 11:00 PM.
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#56
08-18-2013, 01:17 AM
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Nice to see you getting some time in Bob, Nice end reminds me of art deco stuff. I am not sure if I will be able to explain this well on paper but I'll have a lash. You need to cut the coco graft parallel to the binding ledge but just proud of the ledge by the width of your purfling (I would razor saw and then pare back to finished with a chisel) then pare the mitre into the purfling attached to the graft to meet the purfling attached to the binding. Pare back a smidge at a time and use the reflection in the back of your chisel to gauge 45 degrees. Hmmm not sure if that helps.
Jim Try some dry runs cutting mitres into purfling with the chisel reflection first.
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#57
08-18-2013, 05:09 AM
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Sorry Bob, I thought I could see a binding channel already there in that pic. Try again. When you rout the binding channel leave it short of the graft from both sides. Then raise the cut by the width of your purf and cut across the graft then clean up and mitre by hand.
Jim
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#58
08-25-2013, 06:06 PM
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I have 4 pieces of cocobolo for the binding, and 4 strips of b/w/b that will be mitered at the tail wedge. I tried using b/w/b before on the side without bending them because I didn't have the equipment. That was extremely hard to do as I had to use CA glue all the way around. Now that I have the bender, it's all much easier.
 Now the bent binding and purfling sitting in the mold waiting for me to get to work.  Now I had a chance to use the binding tower that John Parchem sent to me along with the carriage that I had built. I'm going to tell on myself now. My understanding is that the sides need to be vertical when using the tower. I used my square to check the sides, and found that there were some places that just were not straight up and down. So I had to adjust the carriage several times to get the binding cut.  Even though I had inspected the channels thoroughly, I discovered after installing the binding that there were 2 places where the router had cut that were lower on the sides than they should have been. Part of that was because the b/w/bloodwood/w/b purfling was so wide that the router just barely sat on the top. So I went to my hand held binding jig. Somewhere in all that, I had those two places. I can take two pieces of very thin mahogany from my cutoffs and glue them in. It will be mostly, if not totally, hidden when I'm done. This picture is the top being bound.  And some shots after the glue dried. I very carefully went over the binding edges with a chisel to pare down where the binding and purfling were proud of the top. I'll do the back later. It'll hopefully save time when trying to flush everything up.    Other than the two mistakes along the side (treble side), the binding/purfling is pretty well seated. Now it's just a matter of getting everything flush.
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#60
08-25-2013, 09:12 PM
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Not very well. I didn't see your post until after I'd started with it. I got it pretty close, and once I get the binding level, I'll know more.
I appreciate your thoughts on that, and will be doing it that way the next time for sure.
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