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

[Mary]

A few years ago when Tim had a mustache, a local customer found a small piece of hair after Tim trimmed it. At first he was concerned. Then he decided it was worth it to have more DNA than any other McGit had afforded.

Soon after the mustache was history.

[Neil K Walk]

Sorry. The only DNA on it is John's so I guess it must be his. Lucky for me he hates big-bodied guitars.

[Kitchen Guitars]

Hey, no hate for big guitars. For 2 years there my neck went numb playing them. But that was from a shoulder injury.

Remember setting up the band saw at the beginning of your project? It took 6 months for my thumb to heal. Blood everywhere. You "Are you mad" Me "NO, just Bleeding and I want it to quit"!

[Kitchen Guitars]

BTW lets run your neck boards through the Jet 10/20 before you glue them up.

[Neil K Walk]

Originally Posted by Kitchen Guitars

Hey, no hate for big guitars. For 2 years there my neck went numb playing them. But that was from a shoulder injury.

Remember setting up the band saw at the beginning of your project? It took 6 months for my thumb to heal. Blood everywhere. You "Are you mad" Me "NO, just Bleeding and I want it to quit"!

LOL - we both pretty much had to learn to set up and use that things - as well as the Jett drum sander.

I only want to do a couple of passes on the Jet the with riftsawn boards in the interest of getting a good glue joint. They're pretty much S4S already and I don't want to whittle away too much width given that the inner 3 plies make up the tenon and the center layer should be the same width as the truss rod. Speaking of which, I need to order me up a 14.5" double action truss rod.

BTW, let's open this up for discussion. John and I have talked about this a little but I'd like to hear what others think. I'm going to be making a laminated neck using 3 1/4" thick riftsawn veneers (either maple/walnut/maple or maple/rosewood/maple) for the inner 3/4" section. The tenon on my plans is 3/4" wide and the channel for the truss rod channel is 1/4" wide. For the outer layers I have two riftsawn boards of mahogany and am debating about which one to use. Sorry, no pics to illustrate for comparison/contrast though.

One is darker and denser than the other. Brookside lumber (local to me) claims it's Honduran mahogany but it's ribboned an awful lot like sapele. I bought it a year ago and it's pretty much ready to go as far as moisture content and acclimation goes.

The other I picked up from Rockler and is lighter in color and weight and more closely matches the coloring of the back and sides. The weight thing is incidental though since this other board is slightly smaller than the first one I picked up. It has a nice solid ring to it and feels less "oily" than the first board I picked up.

So which one should I use?

[Neil K Walk]

So last night I got to devote a couple of hours toward getting started on the body binding. The rosewood binding is to be bound below and inside the main channel by bold BWB purfling. Actually, during the course of measuring/sighting up the laminate trimmer's flush cut bearing I found that an additional strip of purfling was necessary. I don't have pictures but I pulled a double-strip of black/brown purfling for the top and a less bold BWB strip for the back.

After the fiasco with trimming the excess top and back material on the router table - without the use of a flush cut bit - I was worried that another pass with a laminate trimmer would have similarly disastrous results. As it turned out, I didn't have much to worry about after all. As you can see, there's only a little left of that chipped out section at the edge of the upper bout. This is just the first pass though so even less will remain - I'd guess maybe even just a single grain line based on that notch I did with the laminate trimmer set to cut the channel for the purfling inside the binding.



One thing that complicated matters was that I wasn't able to get the edge of the top 100% flush with the sides so I had to forego cutting that upper channel and move on to focusing on the main outer channel first. See how wiggly? :



BTW, this was the first chance I was able to fully appreciate the relief and sense of accomplishment of completing the cloed soundbox. The cracked back brace may not be pretty but it's all back together and the box rings like a gong.



Anyway, I just got acclimated enough to complete the top cut. Next time I'll do the main channel for the back then move on to doing those inner passes. The rosewood strips have been lightly sanded with 400 grit to remove any burrs and are ready to be bent with the Fox bender, just as I did with the mahogany sides.

As always thanks goes to Kitchen Guitars for the coaching and the use of the tools. I hope you don't mind if I pat myself on the back a little for not tearing out the top though!

[charles Tauber]

Suggestion: When routing the binding channels, the router setup references the surface of the top or back for height and the side for depth. If the reference surfaces require significant smoothing/sanding AFTER the binding channels are cut (and binding installed), it will affect the finished height and thickness of the bindings. This can be minimized by having the body in an all-but-final-sanding condition.

I notice from your photos heavy scratches in the top near the butt and, of course the step from the cracked top. Removing those after the binding channels are cut will alter the finished binding sizes.

[Kitchen Guitars]

Charles, the scratches go the whole way around. The binding will be even

[Neil K Walk]

I appreciate the sentiment, Charles. That's the hazards of doing your first build with western red cedar. When I ran it through the thickness sander I intentionally left it a little thicker (.120-.125") and didn't even bother swapping out the 80 grit roll on the drum sander for 100 grit. I figured it was going to get marred and that it would be best to smooth it all out once it came time to level the binding with the top.

[Neil K Walk]

I did a little more routing last night:





The top doesn't look as pretty but I'll fix it next time. Sorry no pix.

Next time I do the binding. Here's a mockup of the purfling/binding that I made to set up the bit on the laminate trimmer but obviously I measured wrong and will have to reconsider for the back. The front should be OK though.



BTW, I've heard many luthiers on the Official Luthier's Forum claim that routing for binding is the most stressful part of the build for them but oddly I found experience enjoyable. Sure there are a couple spots that need some filling in on the top but it's coming together better than I'd hoped. This step made me realize how close I am to finishing the body.


...oh wait, I still have to think about finish. That means sanding, sanding and more sanding!

[Mary]

And then after that, you get to do a little more sanding.

You are doing fine. You and John are moving right along.

[Neil K Walk]

I took a little time today to try and distract myself from my son's situation and fired up the bandsaw to cut laminates for the neck. I cut out a template from a sheet of 1/8" plexiglass earlier in the week and used it to trace outlines on some riftsawn wood that I bought from Rockler a couple of months ago. Then I did a dry-fitting to see how they lined up. The outer layers are mahogany (I believe they're African mahogany,) the inner layers are maple and the center layer is walnut.



Comparing against the plans and the template:


I cut a little extra to the thickness and length of the headstock. The plans also call for a volute which is tricky to cut out close with my little 9" Ryobi bandsaw so it looks ugly but I'm not worried. I may go without the volute altogether though.


I put a fresh blade on the bandsaw but it's got a pretty big tooth and left some bites that I'm going to have to plane smooth. I also need to glue "wings" on the headstock but that will all be hidden by a rosewood faceplate:


The three center layers measure exactly at 3/4" which is what the plans call for the width of the tenon. I have a pre-mortised neck block in the body so I won't know for certain if it will be a perfect fit until I rout away the sides around the mortise:


Once I cut out the wings I'll glue it all together. I may need to buy more of these clamps; they only cost $3 apiece at Harbor Freight. Then I'll move on to routing out the truss rod channel. I haven't decided on a shape to the headstock yet but I really like the look of Collings' headstocks. They're sort of Gibson-esque:

http://elderly.com/images/new_instru...-front_sm_.jpg

PS: tonight after I visited my son I went over to my friend's shop and finished up the end wedge on the body. It's east Indian rosewood bound by fine BWB purfling strips. For some reason it was much trickier than cutting out the laminates for the neck. Pics to follow once the glue cures and the EIR is sanded flush to the sides.

[Neil K Walk]

Tonight I cleaned up the end wedge:







I know: it's not perfect but given that this is my first and it's for me I'd say it's "good enough." I already know what I'm going to do differently next time: do the wedge just after gluing in the blocks just like that O'Brien guy on Youtube says to do. He makes it look soooo easy.

I also glued up the neck blank. I'll take pics when it's presentable; there's lots of glue slop and I need to trim all the rough cuts to match the target profile.

[Mary]

It IS a wonderful first try. I'm excited for you to see what you will come up with in the long run.

Guitar building is great therapy, Neil.

[Neil K Walk]

I haven't been able to get to my John's shop and have been sitting on some extra wood to make laminated necks so I went and cut out some plies the other nights. This time around I used the original 3/4" x 24" x 6" Honduran mahogany board I bought last year along with more 1/4" maple and a spare cut of 1/4" walnut. As you can see, the Honduran is much darker and IMO denser. If I don't use it this time around I could see it matched up with rosewood back & sides:



Here's the first one for reference:



My little 9" Ryobi bandsaw has a new blade but I think I dulled it when I cut out the 1/4" maple ply on the last neck. I did a little better accommodating for the volute:



No, it's not glued up yet. All my clamps are still on the first one so all I have are 2 longer ones that I bought to repair some furniture in my house. There are a few things I want to address first anyway. First is the truss rod slot. On the first attempt I didn't rout out or cut for the truss rod, but I 'm weighing on cutting the top 3/8" off the central 1/4" ply to accommodate it. FWIW the boards I've used are S4S so that the fingerboard face and tenon sides are perfectly flat - at least they are in relation to the steel table on my little bandsaw.



There's also a lot of extra wood around where the tenon will be. I could potentially save myself a lot of work - or set myself up for a colossal failure - if I cut away at the area beforehand. According to my plans, the three inner layers are all I'll need - but it come down to the actual dimensions of the pre-cut mortise in my neck block. I won't be able to measure that until after I finish the body binding and rout away the sides in that area though.

...then there's the headstock. This time around I traced the inner walnut ply instead of the clear plastic template so there's a little extra all around. The plans leave some extra space to work with so maybe THIS won't be an issue. Just in case, I measure the headstock thickness on my Martin D-16GT just to be sure and I think I'm OK: