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In making my second guitar I would like to make a solid wood rosette bordered by a thin piece of ebony on both the inside and outside edges. The question I have is can I bend ebony in a tight circle if it's thin enough? do I need to wet and heat it on a form like the sides are bent, or will it conform to the rosette if bent slowly and gently? Or do you guys just use a pice of plastic binding for this application?

Greg

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Gwaltney Guitars

[QUOTE=GregG] The question I have is can I bend ebony in a tight circle if it's thin enough?

Greg[/QUOTE]

That is a relative question. How thin are you talking? The same thickness as your binding should be able to bend with heat and some moisture if you take it slow and use something to back it when you bend. I remember a reply to a post on the MIMF from Mario where he bent a piece of maple around a 3/8 or 1/2" bolt. Couldn't find the archive there though.Rod True38712.5406712963

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If the ebony is fairly thin .050" or so, you should be able to pull it off if you go slow & use lots of heat & don't let the piece dry out as you work it. Ebony rarely gives any warning before it snaps in two... especially if it has some runout. (usually)
Expect to break a few pieces getting a feel for it.
Black fibre or ebonized maple will look exactly the same under finish.

Why not just cut circular pieces from a headstock plate, then join with epoxy and dust. It should be invisible at the joints.

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

If you ar egoing for a thin purfling strip look why not just use dued maple? I doubt you would be able to tell the difference between this and ebony at such a thin width.

What is dued maple?

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Gwaltney Guitars

[QUOTE=GregG] What is dued maple?[/QUOTE]

I think Robbie meant dyed (or ebonized) maple.

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Dave Rector
Rector Guitars

[QUOTE=GregG] What is dued maple?[/QUOTE]

"Dued, where's my maple?!!!"

hahahaha, sorry guys! I did mean dyed.

THere are other options as well. I have dyed black fibre that is .020 thick. I also have laminated black dyed pearwood/maple/black dyed pearwood for a BWB line that is about .060 thick. One issue with a wood that is hard to bend into the channel you rout is the risk of you have of denting the spruce top as you try to get the trim into the channel.

Shane

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Canada

Some good comments already here, but I can see why you want to use "real" ebony, because it is. Not fake, not a substitute, etc. Now, nothing wrong with those, but it is a personal thing.

That being said, no reason for a problem. Thickness IS a concern. At 1/8" it can be a pain. The same wood at 0.08" is an entirely different beast. And at 0.015 or so, you can usually wrap it around your finger dry. Of course, that is all with good straight grained wood. very important. For the tricky bends, I like to start with a piece that has a crack along the grain and I just cut my pieces aligned with that. Flat-sawn or quartersawn, it does not seem to matter. The only other problem that you can run into is wood that is from near the center of the tree, which can be very brittle. No way to make that work.

Hope this helps.

Grant Goltz

You could pre-bend everything and assemble the whole rosette off the guitar around a form. But, I think the dued maple is a good idea, too. ROBBIE, do you show how to finish this maple on the new DVD that I just ordered?

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

I agree. The dyed maple (or wood of you choice) is the way to go.

If you are going to make the thin ring 1/8" thick I would not bend but rather cut ID/OD rings. This is not a simple task this thin but I would think you would have a greater sucess rate than try ing to bend to a 4.9 ID out of 1/8" stock.

That said I have to say I use a lot of black fiber and dyed Maple. The Black fiber at .04 needs no heat to bend around a rosette.

I'm with MichaelP. I wouldn't bother trying to bend it.... I'd just inlay a rosette, and then cut out an ebony ring about the finished thickness of the soundboard, getting the OD right but leaving it somewhat wider. Once inlaid, then cut the soundhole out in such a way as to get the desired ID of the ebony ring/binding. Then thickness the soundboard.

Sounds like the easiest and cleanest way to me. But I've never tried to bend ebony into a circle.jfrench38713.4682407407

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I use a small piece of aluminum foil folded over the section I'm bending and that works similar to using foil in a fox style bender. I just slide it along as I go and it helps keep moisture in avoiding burns. If your piece is going to be thinner than that you could glue up more than one piece of ebony or "eubonized" veneer to your taste without bending.

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Ken Franklin
clumsy yet persistent
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Brian Burns often uses ebony as binding on his classical and flamenco guitars. He showed me this nifty little device he had cobbled together to keep the ebony from cracking when bending the waist section (about a 2.5" diameter bend). It's a narrow strip of spring steel about 5" long with a tiny machinists clamp on each end. He clamps the strip in place and then uses it the way one uses slats for bending sides, then bends the binding over a hot pipe. I tried it out and found that it worked well.

Best,

Michael

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I can't tell the differance between dyed (dued ) maple and ebony unless I have off color ebony, which helps distingush it from plastic btw. The black purf lines from suppliers like stew-mac or lmi are dyed maple. No need to pre bend. I use thre to give me a with of .07 or so. matches ebony binding really well. It all looks like plastic under lacquer unfortunatly, but I sleep well at night knowing its real wood Jim_W38714.0502314815

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Jim Watts
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