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I have been making a few LPs with rosewood top caps...   while they are really fun to carve by hand I think I am about ready to hand this off to a mechanized tool.

Does anyone have a duplicarver and an LP template?

I would be willing to pay you to rough out a few bodies for me.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

I saw one somewhere on the net that reasnably priced and just the right size for guitar bodies I will check my history see if I can find it. mean while Googel duplicatorsMichaelP38618.7286689815

Brock, a buddy of mine , L. D. Temple built one to carve the top for a Les Paul. It is a bit of a Rube Goldberg contraption but it works great! He would probably do some work for you or tell you how to build your own. I`ll send you his e-mail address if you are interested.

Sure Dale. I am interested.

In all probability, I really don't have the space for my own duplicarver... (unless I put it in the garage... and that might meet with some dissention...)

but I would happily pay someone to hog out some bodies for me. Going after that rosewood and cocobolo with a hand plane is not much fun....

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Brock his e-mail address is sippy55@aol.com. His name is L.D.Temple.

Brock,

John Watkins may do tops for you on his cnc...I know he was doing stuff in the past for folks, but I'm not sure what he's doing now. He's made some great looking stuff on it. You can PM him, he's a member here.

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"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 have a duplicator set up but it would probably be a huge hassle getting the bodies through customs twice..

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CVT Inc.
A tour of our shop (Somewhat outdated)
My Personal eBay profile. BCWoodBug

Considering one is a BRW top... I am sure.

But thanks for the offer.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Guys,

If any of you know of this sort of contraption that would work for acoustic necks (including the heels), let me know. Dunno if I could afford the bux for a real duplicarver any time soon, but I could probably build one if I had plans.

Best,

Michael

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Live to Play, Play to Live

I have a full size duplicarver. I have used it for roughing archtops and cellos.

They work well but take up lots of space. Mine has a 26 inch duplication width (which makes the width x 2) and unlimited length but what that means is that it is that the worktable is over 5 feet wide by over 5 feet deep. That means that when it is setup it takes up way too much precious shop floor space.

I built a stand for mine that allows me to flip the top 90 degrees so that I can push it up against a wall when not in use. I got the idea from seeing how someone else had done for theirs...I think it was in one of the GAL books and done by Steve Grimes but I am not sure.

It would make fast work of LP style bodies and could also be used for routing cavities and such.

On MIMF there are some good views of ones that people have built rather than bought.

MIcheal you can build an inexpensive duplicator, the most expensive part other than the laminate trimmer is the sheet of plywood its built on. At a later point you can always rebuild and goto high end bearings and steel everything ;)

Do a google search for "copycarver" you should find the site where they sell plans.. You can get a good enough idea to build your own just from the photos but the actual plans are quite handy and pretty cheap.
Jason38618.8831134259

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CVT Inc.
A tour of our shop (Somewhat outdated)
My Personal eBay profile. BCWoodBug

Brock, how many LP style guitars do you plan on building? The reason I ask is that carving the arch on a LP isn't all that bad. I build Archtop guitars and use the method descriped in the Benedetto book (drill holes to depth). Instead of hogging off the wood with hand planes, I use a cheap angle grinder and a Lancelot blade. For LP's you could easily get away with fitting a 40 grit sanding disk to your angle grinder. I can rough carve an Archtop maple plate convex and concave side in a couple of hours....and LP would take 1/2 the time. Don't hesitate to ask me more on the how to or email me if you'd like. If you've got an angle grinder, you'll be able to do it in less time than if you package and mail your plates to someone who has a CNC or duplicarver.

If you build a lot of LP style guitars -- a duplicarver or home made one might make sense.

Shawn the coolest duplicarver I've seen is Steve Anderson's -- his is featured in one of the GAL Big Red Books.Anthony Z38620.475625

Steve Anderson....that is the duplicator that I was thinking of...the pivoting stand was very cool.

Speaking of using a grinder for archtop plates...At the ASIA symposium I asked Linda Manzer if she had looked at the ShopBot CNC system and she replied that she still uses a grinder with a lancelot blade. For her she felt that if she went with a CNC in her shop it would be a slippery slope towards production parts production as opposed to handmade.

Her bias is based on the fact that she started out working for Jean Larrivee back before Jean started the move past handmade to higher "factory" production and it was that memory that pushed her to build on her own and she as an artist wants to keep her production at a personal level.

Brock,
I was going to recomend what Anthony said.
It takes me about 3-4 hours to carve both sides of an archtop with the lancelot carver.
Just be careful if you use one-they can be very dangerous to use.

I have done it by hand quite a few times, but this is rosewood and it carves a lot harder than the maple. I have done several of them exactly like how he mentioned. I am going to make 3 in the next batch and I was looking for the easy way out.

That lancelot blade scares the bejeezus out of me.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Using the lancelot carver is sort of like driving down the highway at 70mph-one false move and your dead.
I have always felt that as long as you have one hand around the body of the grinder and the other hand on the auxillary handle then there's no hands left to hurt.
Light passes are also helpful.
Of course go with your gut feeling and don't try it if you don't feel comfortable with the idea.Brad Goodman38621.3826041667

Brad--I worry about my gut feeling---feeling really bad after the lancelot bites into it.   I've honestly thought about putting a 12" square piece of sheet metal in my front apron pocket for armor.
Nelson

yeah, that is what I was thinking too. gut, leg. Lots of bad things to hit.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Brock, I hear you about the Lancelot -- it's kinda like petting a doberman. You've got to go with what is comfortable for you. (I have a huge fear of using a router table). An alternative to a Lancelot is an ArborTech or a Kutzall. The latter two are less likely to jump and cause you harm.

Seriously, for the amount of arch in a LP, a 40 grit disk, orbital sander and scrappers should do the trick.

I am pretty comfortable using the Lancelot. When in use -- I keep it at least two feet away from my midsection and both hands on it. A leather apron might not be a bad idea.

Nelson -- you use a Lancelot -- what did your CNC machine break

Anthony--I get to feeling so guilty letting the CNC do all the work that I have to do a little handcarving occasionally to ease the guilt.
Actually I used to carve all my archtop plates by hand with the lancelot type cutter but then switched to the arbortech you mentioned. I feel a little more comfortable with it but it's still plenty aggressive.
Nelson