Official Luthiers Forum!

So, to yet again try to reduce my impact on my bank balance (oh, and maybe the rainforests) I have embarked on another recycled timber guitar. The back and sides are from an old desk that was discarded on the roadside. From what I can tell it was manufactured in the 1950's from Tasmanian Mountain Ash. All the timber was perfectly quarter sawn and after resawing had a fairly good tap tone. The top is a piece of Australian Red Cedar (Toona Australis) that was an offcut given to me from an old builder. He reckoned he had it for at least 20 years in his pile of offcuts he just couldn't throw away.
The Rosette is made up from left over rounds from the inside of previous guitar rosettes (I struggle to throw them out). The neck will be recycled cedar from an old fence. Fretboard and Bridge to be decided on yet. I do have some old blanks but I'd love to use something completely recycled.

I build fairly simply and am regularly inspired by some of the work that appears in these forums. One day I will venture into some more complex builds but for now I am enjoying the basics.

Bending the Mountain Ash


Old rosettes rounds


Snapped up and joined into a random pattern


The Cedar top is quite stiff and taps nicely. The rosette is coming together too.


Mixture of old offcuts of Cedar and Bunya Pine for the bracing


Joining back and sides




Joining the top to close the box.


Binding channels routed and recycled Jarrah for the bindings

_________________
Martin Taylor
http://martintaylorguitars.com.au

That looks great! I'll be using your rosette idea in a couple weeks. Thanks!

That's neat, Martin. I'm interested in your rosette technique. Not the assorted sound hole scraps, but the way you have glued them. They appear to be glued to a thin piece of cedar or something similar. Would you elaborate a bit about this? For example, do you sand or scrape most of that cedar away after your glue-up has cured? Or after routing the rosette to shape? I'd be very interested in knowing how you do this.
Thanks in advance.
Patrick

Yes, do tell about your rosette...

_________________
Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Thanks for the interest everyone.

The rosette "technique" was just a guess but what I did was draw it up very roughly first (as you can see in the pic), break my pieces into the shapes and sand straight edges on them and then glue them to a thin piece of hardwood scrap. I then sanded the top flat (using my drum sander).

I then routed out the rosette shape as normal with my dremel.

When I routed the groove on the soundboard the depth was slightly less than the "mosaic" layer.

The trick was that when I glued the rosette into the soundboard I did it upside down with the thin hardwood on top (for the really observant you can see that the final result is reversed) Then I planed off the "backing" so that the mosaic layer was fully in the soundboard. I then sanded it smooth. I must say I am happy with the result.

_________________
Martin Taylor
http://martintaylorguitars.com.au

Martin,
Yes, of course....perfect. It's so obvious, so simple, but ONLY after you point it out to me. How cool is that?! Thank you for explaining. Pretty soon, lots of people will be following your lead on this.

Patrick