Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi!

I'm thinking about maybe trying build a Williams binding jig. It looks fairly simple but I don't understand couple things and wanted to ask you folks who build one or knows the answer to my questions.

My questions evolved from reading this article.
http://www.dewguitars.com/BindingJig/Binding%20Jig.htm

-parallelogram arms are made of solid maple instead of Baltic birch ply, why not make that part with ply to simplify the build? I'm guessing there are good reason(s) but can't figure out why.

-Baltic birch plywood, what is "Baltic"?

-The bottom of the laminate trimmer base gets a disc made from UHMW plastic (Ultra High Molecular Weight). How do I go about making the donut? or is that a simple part I can pickup from the hardware store?

-Did you guys make the base of carriage assembly 2' x 2' ? if not, what size did you choose?
Thanks, David

Hard maple has less deflection

Baltic is a region that the Birch grows in and thus a subspecies of birch is referred to as Baltic Birch


UHMW plastic is easily machined into a round shape several of our vendors like John Hall at Blues Creek Guitars carry the donuts made up.

the parallelogram arms are often made using phenolic rather than maple.

you may also find the high grade ply labled russian birch.

as can be seen in the photo in the article you cited, as shown the base of the carriage is wider than necessary, and can be shortened as well as narrowed a bit. just make sure that the base fully supposts the guitar holding clamps.

I just make one last week.

-parallelogram arms are made of solid maple instead of Baltic birch ply, why not make that part with ply to simplify the build? I'm guessing there are good reason(s) but can't figure out why.

I made mine out of a piece of HOG I got from the local Menards (Home Depot and Lowes type place). I used HOG for its dimensions stability. I assume drilling the hole across the plywood wouldn’t work that great. It may work at first, but I think it would delaminate after a while.

-Baltic birch plywood, what is "Baltic"?

A type of birch. This is the nice clean stuff you can get from Rockler or Woodcraft that doesn’t have voids. I used some common grade birch from the Depot. Lots of voids, but it worked with a little selective cutting. Its just not as pretty.

-The bottom of the laminate trimmer base gets a disc made from UHMW plastic (Ultra High Molecular Weight). How do I go about making the donut? or is that a simple part I can pickup from the hardware store?

You may be able to get a nylon disc from the hardware store, but I just bought a $2 cutting board at Target and cut it up. Cut with the banksaw and shaped with the disc sander. The surface is textured, so I had to sand and buff it out. I used this for the parallelogram sides as well.

-Did you guys make the base of carriage assembly 2' x 2' ? if not, what size did you choose?

I think 24x20

Just in Time for St. Patty's......... I give you the William's Jig
[img][/img]
Peter

I should clarify that I only have a 1” diameter donut under there, so that you may find at a hardware store in Nylon. I also added a 6” bearing under the trimmer to allow the use of a standard ¼” downcut bit for all sizes. The bearing guide on my Makita trimmer didn’t have enough travel to get the wide perflings or shell cuts, so I also had to make a new piece for the bearing guide using that same cutting board stock. It replaced the bearing and runs right on the UHMW piece, no bearing.

Zach - I made a jig with the second lazy susan bearing too and have also noticed that there is not enough travel in the Makita bearing assembly to cut wide purfling ledges with a 1/4" spiral bit. Do you have a picture of the modification you made to the Makita base?

Thanks, Paul

Well, I don't know who that Willimas fellow is, but I have a similar jig, and I used maple for the parallelogram just because I had a bunch laying around the shop. Same thing with the phenolic for the side pieces, but that was a great choice in my mind because it's very stable. I think Hesh has a picture of the UHMW donut on his jig, which I believe was turned on a lathe. I used nylon washers with the through bolts because they allow you to tighten up the unit and still leave motion in it.

_________________
"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

I made this from some scrap. Cut on the band saw, shape with the disc sander and mill he channels with the drill press and router bits. I started to cut the guide channel on the wrong side, so the narrow channel doesn’t need to be there. I CA glued the two pieced together because the threads run further down than one piece. I could actually take off the second piece as there is enough engagement around the top piece. The glue joint started to separate when I cut the threads. Should have clamped it. You will need access to a M6 tap.

Another note with the main lazy Suzan. I crimped it a bit to tighten it up, but still had more slop in it than I wanted. So I put my parrot vise on top to preload the bearing and put my little two axis on the far end as a counter balance. No slop now.

Thanks for the pic, that is exactly what I need.

Peace, Paul

Zach,

Nice modification - I'm just lazy and use a wider router bit when I need to.

_________________
Dave White
De Faoite Stringed Instruments
". . . the one thing a machine just can't do is give you character and personalities and sometimes that comes with flaws, but it always comes with humanity" Monty Don talking about hand weaving, "Mastercrafts", Weaving, BBC March 2010

I used just ordinary 19mm ply for the main construction, plenty good enough for the purpose. But, I did use Baltic for the router support. You'll see that my parallelograms are made from UHMW plastic, and I use metal washers with them and nyloc nuts on the cross bolts. I find I can tighten the nuts to get just the grip I want. I use Dave White's modification to the jig and a DeWalt trimmer with a 1/4" DCSB, which means that you can of course get a 1/4" purfling channel with a single cut, not that I go that wide, you'd have to do multiple cuts for wider, but the bearing on the DeWalt would allow at least 1/2" with no trouble.



Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.