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How do you guys choose to finish out your sound ports? What I mean is: after it’s all said and done what do you do to make it look like it something more than just a hole haha
Do you bind the area? If so how do you bend it that tight?
Do you add depth in some way?
Just curious
B


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I use contrasting laminations for the backing, round the edges so it looks a bit organic and that's it. Of course I also do not do plain holes, if I just did a hole I would probably bind it.

If I recall correctly Alan Caruth had a nice method for binding the holes. I believe he bored a taperd hole then turned a matching tapered plug from contrasting wood; the result was very nice.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I have been backing the side up with two more side thickness layers alternating grain directions. Then I cut the hole with a hole saw. I have a matching hole that I cut in some plywood (lined with packing tape) that I build my soundport binding in. I haven't figured out a good way to easily bend the binding; it is always a struggle. The thinner the layers the better. I make my strips with angled ends so when I glue them together in the plywood hole I can push the ends together like a scarf joint so force the ring tight around the hole. Once they are all laminated, they hold the shape. That ring slides nicely into the soundport since I used the same hole saw. Once it is glued in place I flush it up on the inside and outside.

I then glue in the side purfling scheme to the inside of the rim over the hole and cut the hole out and flush it up by hand. This carries the side purfling theme around the inside of the soundport binding. Hard to explain, but easy to see. Here is a picture of the first one I did that way. I get a little better each time. I'll try to hunt down some in progress pictures.




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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

oops


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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Here is the "mold" I make the ring in. You can see that you should think about what binding woods to use since you will have to deal with the way the scarf lines up. I would rather do the scarf the other way where the binding tapers in thickness (rather than width) but I haven't figured our how to make that work yet.





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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

This demonstrates the scarf clamping I was trying to describe.




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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

After you clean it up, it doesn't look too bad. this picture really shows the joint well. In person, it isn't that noticable now that the wood has oxidized. Still you want to position it strategically so it won't jump out at you.




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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Here it is installed in the rim. Hopefully this will show what I was trying to explain with the side purfling. This guitar only has a cherry veneer between the binding and side wood so I covered the installed ring with a cherry veneer then some side wood. After I recut the hole, the inside of the ring will mimic the side binding theme. This is also another good shot of the scarf joint.




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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I back the area to be routed for the soundport with 2 veneers, one about 1.5mm and a similar colour to the sides, with a contrasting veneer at 0.6mm cross plied between them, usually to match the binding.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

This is a one-off based on the Greene & Greene designs of the 1930s.


On a more conventional note, Chechen on BRW.


The scarf joint will be tapered like Bryan's, making the OD somewhat adjustable.

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formerly known around here as burbank
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

Like Steve and Colin, I prefer to do much the same. Contrasting laminations of veneer and an off-cut of the side material for backing.

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Peter