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http://w-ww.luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10102&t=1415		 Page 1 of 2
Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 1:26 pm ]
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So every now and then Murphy sticks up his little head and takes a chunk out of me..

I was routing the binding channels for the Zircote guitar, had already done the back, was slowly making my way around the top when BAM!!!!

A piece of kerfing popped and the router bit made this nice little dime size dig in my top. After saying a bunch of not so nice words I found a cutoff from the top and made a little patch and "Attempted" to fix it, here is the result










This is the first time I have ever had this happen on eight guitars using this Jig (the LMI binding one), I just sent a message to Mark Kett to switch over to his so it can't happen again. I glued the patch in and then attempted to steam it so the wood would swell together, it helped some but not much. Unless someone has a better solution I'm going to stay with my BWB for the inner purfling, buy some .079" abalone and inlay that with another strip of the BWB purfling, I just don't know what else to do. My only concern is getting to close to the edge of the kering and making the top weak along those edges. I'm sure this has happened to other builders, just not sure what to do about it.

Outside of that I found that 1/16" brass tubing works pretty good for side dots:



What hurts the most is that Bobs wood for this is just killer:



Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

-Paul-
Author:  Chas Freeborn [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 1:39 pm ]
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How about a sunburst finish on the top?
-C
Author:  John Mayes [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 1:55 pm ]
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Murphy pops his head up?? Dude has a corner office in my shop.
Author:  jfrench [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:07 pm ]
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Well nobody wanted to listen to me in the redwood thread... seems like everyone wants elaborate solutions to simple problems. But if you score your line first with a gramil/purfling cutter you won't get tear out from routers and the like.

They're a cheap investment considering the headache it will save you, and since it indexes off the side you have a perfect perimiter marked to true up your channels with a file after routing. You could make one cheaply if you didn't want to purchase one.

I'd go with wider purfling, should be ok if there is some spruce left under it. I apologize for not having a better solution to offer but my vote is against a sunburst, that guitar looks like it will be beautiful finished natural.

Best wishes,
Joshua
Author:  Dickey [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:41 pm ]
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Condolences

The sun will come up tomorrow.
Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:06 pm ]
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I'm against doing a sunburst on this one, I did think about it though..

I'm going to go with abalam around the edges and the bold BWB on the inner and outer, I hadn't planned to but with a little thinning on that side it should bring me right on top or just to the line of that part, I'll just make the inlay and inner purfling thin to keep as much of the top structure as I can.

It's just an expensive mistake, Abalam is not cheap...

Cheers

-Paul-
Author:  Steve Kinnaird [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:13 pm ]
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You'll no doubt hate this, but...

New top. I think the back / sides deserve it, and you won't really be happy with anything else. It'll be great experience, plus one of those stories you can pull out when other luthiers start talking horror tales.

I'm sure sorry... it hurts just to think about it.

Steve

P.S.-- Or, keep it as is, leave the back / sides alone, and paint the top black. (Or, new top )Steve Kinnaird38431.9688078704
Author:  EricKeller [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:15 pm ]
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Had that same thing happen at the waist of my gibson that I replaced the top on. Since it's my personal guitar, I don't really care in the end, but it does ruin your day.
Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:31 pm ]
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[QUOTE=jfrench] Well nobody wanted to listen to me in the redwood thread... seems like everyone wants elaborate solutions to simple problems. But if you score your line first with a gramil/purfling cutter you won't get tear out from routers and the like.

They're a cheap investment considering the headache it will save you, and since it indexes off the side you have a perfect perimiter marked to true up your channels with a file after routing. You could make one cheaply if you didn't want to purchase one.

I'd go with wider purfling, should be ok if there is some spruce left under it. I apologize for not having a better solution to offer but my vote is against a sunburst, that guitar looks like it will be beautiful finished natural.

Best wishes,
Joshua[/QUOTE]

Josh...

Cutting a purfling line first would have made no difference in this case, I think you have a valid point about not getting tear-out, but this was more like Tear-In

And I agree about the sunburst, I built this one for the beauty of the wood, I'm banking that adding the abalam will cover up the problem.

Cheers

-Paul-
Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:37 pm ]
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[QUOTE=Steve Kinnaird] You'll no doubt hate this, but...

New top. I think the back / sides deserve it, and you won't really be happy with anything else. It'll be great experience, plus one of those stories you can pull out when other luthiers start talking horror tales.

I'm sure sorry... it hurts just to think about it.

Steve

P.S.-- Or, keep it as is, leave the back / sides alone, and paint the top black. (Or, new top )[/QUOTE]

Your right I don't like it at all!

I don't really have the time to replace the top, too much work, I have the neck set and everything else is ready to go (I planned on carving the neck this week). I'm going to try the abalam, if that does not fix it then I'll glue up a new top and rosette and do that. I can salvage the abalam if I fail, I'm pretty good at doing inlay like this so once I have the parts it should go pretty quick. I just hate being this close and getting bit, I'm going to sleep on it and see if I change my mind.

Hell I might even just leave it and call it a beauty mark, this WAS going to Healdsburg, not sure about that now

Thanks

-Paul-
Author:  jfrench [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:42 pm ]
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Paul,

If the purflings will cover it up then I am with you. A new top as Steve mentioned also crossed my mind. In the end the most important thing is that no one can look at it and criticize you for it. If you had to put in an entire week of extra work on the guitar its much better than having someone point out a mistake.

I think you're on the right track though here. It will be a more elaborate instrument!

As far as scoring the line before hand is concerned.. i think I need to clarify myself a little bit. I learned by chiseling out the binding and purfling channels. Thus, I use the gramil tool to cut the purfling ledge pretty much to depth as though I were going to chisel it out. I route it instead of chisel it, but it does ensure that there is no chipping at all.

If the cut is deep with the gramil - assuming the problem you had was not with the router slipping beyond where it should, but rather that a piece tore out - it would have solved the problem beforehand.

I don't mean score as in lightly cut, I mean to cut the full depth of the channel with the gramil. Then it will never chip out beyond that cut.

best wishes,
Joshua
Author:  jfrench [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:45 pm ]
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Wait a second.... you are cutting your purfling channel before your binding channel, right? Or both at the same time? jfrench38431.9919560185
Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:59 pm ]
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Nooooooo...

I did this one backwards for some dang reason, I had people in the shop and was showing them how it worked. I'm used to being alone in the shop and normally figure things our well in advance so stupid things like this don't happen.

I'm going to go to bed and start over tomorrow night when I get back from work, I'll fix popped kerfing pieces, clean things up by hand. Cut and lay in the end graft and back binding and get it all ready for the inlay pieces.

I agree this will fix it, or make it so small that I don't think it will show..

Cheers

-Paul-
Author:  jfrench [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 4:07 pm ]
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Paul - best of luck with that. You'll feel great once you make it disappear. Whenever I correct a mistake I always feel good about it. After all, if making a guitar were easy everyone would be doing it and no one would be paying to have you do it!jfrench38432.0093402778
Author:  Mario [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 4:21 pm ]
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Whoah, wait a minute! Back up, back up!

This photo of the guitar's back, what am I seeing? did you rout right through to the linings, all the way around? And how wide will the bindings be? Man, they look to be about 3/8" wide by how thick?

Tell me it's an illusion.....

Author:  Sprockett [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 5:33 pm ]
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Mario..

You made me jump out the shop to check, ya right to the edge of the bindings (not through them, just the thickness of the sides), that should be fine the binding is only .086 thick and I left it just a hair proud so I could shave it down a bit once installed. It's an illusion, this is standard binding that I get from Pegasus and it's a hair under 1/4" tall (I sand one edge down for a good mating surface), but it also has some bold WBW on the bottom of it making it a little deeper. I think it's just the picture, I shot that in close up mode, it looks right in person

Man you gotta stop doing that

So do you have any Mario type suggestions on how to fix this??

Cheers

-Paul-
Author:  Mario [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 6:07 pm ]
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Well, my "fix" would be to just toss the top and put a new one on there. But I work on spec, so I have no choice.

The only other options are to do as you're thinking, with wide pruflings, but, look at your overall design to see if it will work together. From that repair, it looks like it will be a super wide set of purflings... This is a personal opinion, but with a bold and wide rosette already, and bold and wide binings and side purflings, it could easily become 'too much' with the super wide top purflings. Or, it may all tie together nicely; Depends on the eye of the beholder.

You could also do a nice inlay there. Be creative.... Larry Robinson got his start in inlaying because of just such a problem!

Okay, now for what I don't like to see....

I don't like to see the whole side routed off for the bindings. You are on the linings! Yeah, you're just kissing them, but there's no more side. How much more lining, and how thick is the lining, that's left? Linings often taper in a triangular cross section; if yours do so, there's not a whole lot left there, tying everything together.

I'm sure others have built this way, too, but, but, but man, that scares me. <g>

So, what happened to the top was that you routed for the bindings first, then tried to cut the purfling ledge with the bearing riding in the binding's channel? And the channel, being on the lining, was weak, and the lining "fell in"? Or am I reading this all wrong?
Author:  CarltonM [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 6:25 pm ]
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Paul...Ouch! I once asked Grit Laskin if his "armrest" insert idea came about after a tragic router accident. He wasn't amused, but my point is that it seems virtually ANY lutherie mistake can be fixed. Ya just gotta think outside the box (no pun intended). Have you heard Ervin Somogyi's tale about when he thinned the back of a neck too far and exposed the truss rod on an otherwise finished guitar? I imagine my first response would be, "Man! Now I gotta remove this neck and start over!" HIS solution, however, was to inlay a chunk of mahogany along the length of the neck and then border the repair with an interesting purfling design. After that he says he started to get requests from new customers to make their guitars with the fancy neck! What that taught me is that if you can't hide it, make it look pretty! It sounds like you have some ideas along that line, but remember, wider purfling and binding aren't your only options. It looks like the accident happened near the tail block. You could design an inlay of some sort along the end of the soundboard, that just "happens" to cover the boo-boo. Or, since you're building this on spec(?), you could do something unique, like an inlay that looks like a Band-Aid. Yeah, I know, but if you make it look pretty, people WILL ask you for the story behind it, and you'll have one of the most memorable instruments at Healdsburg, and that's saying a lot! Good luck.

Carlton

P.S. I really like the binding and inlay scheme on your fingerboard. Is that cocobolo?
Author:  Bobc [ Sun Mar 20, 2005 8:25 pm ]
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Paul I'm with Mario and Steve on this one. I would be very reluctant to route so far into the top. Toss the top and make a new one. It really doesn't take that long and you could work on something else while waiting for glue to dry at various stages of making a new top. It's too nice looking a guitar to not fix it right.
Author:  Matt Gage [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:20 am ]
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I had that same thing happen once when the bearing on the bit fell off during cutting....DOH! My repair looked just like yours....never did hide it.

always check to see if the bearing is tight friends.

Mr.Murphy and I go way back.

Matt
Author:  Don Williams [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:38 am ]
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Yep. Replace that top. You'll regret leaving it on there, unless you disguise it with inlay or someting. You're better replacing the top.
Author:  Mike Mahar [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:41 am ]
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Mario, How thick do you make your sides? LMI's standard wood binding is .080 and I like to thin my sides to just about that much. I've bent thicker sides but bending goes a lot smoother with the sides are thin.
Author:  Mario [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 1:04 am ]
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Mike, I like my sides around .085-.090", and all my bindings are .062".
Author:  Mike Mahar [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 3:10 am ]
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Well that explains why you don't get any dripping when you super glue your bindings in. I'll consider thinner bindings. I wonder how much work it would be to scrape the thick ones down. Should I do it before I put them on the guitar or after?
Author:  Mario [ Mon Mar 21, 2005 3:17 am ]
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Wood bindings = thickness sander.
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