Official Luthiers Forum!

I've seen a number of posts here with people looking for published guitar plans. All of the instruments that I have built so far have been designed from scratch by me in terms of body shape, bracing patterns etc and I have never used any formal plans. I have found this part of the process to be hugely interesting and satisfying and I have learnt a lot from it.

I was wondering if this is just a British or even "me" thing and would be interested to hear how many of you OLF'ers build most of your instruments from your own design/plans or if you rely on published plans.

_________________
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 design my own guitars. It would not be very interesting for me to build someone else's design unless perhaps as an exercise (I have built pretty standard arch top mandolins, but that's because unlike guitars I knew nothing about them at the time). More than wanting the design to be my own it is just that I pretty much can't think without the aid of pencil and paper. Could also be because I'm an architect.Arnt38678.3468634259

_________________
Rian Gitar og Mandolin

I build from my own designs, but some of my shapes are from forms I have bought.

   For beginner I suggest some sort of plan. Things in guitars are often scale length related and a guitar is more than just a box with strings attached. Once you understand what a guitar is then by all means go your own way.
    Guitars have been around a long time and I have seen some great ones and some duds. Have fun and learn. You will allways learn more from a failure than you will from a success
john hall

I think most of the post you have see have been for plans of historical guitar models, OM, OOO, L-sereis Gibsons and such. Most builders, built to historical shapes. I know I do for the most part. Even if I build a total custom shape I make cad plans to aid in the development of patterns and fixtures. If you have purchased a set of the OLF plans for either the SJ or OM you have noticed I draw my plans at full scale to make it easy to trace or cut and paste to build fixtures and patterns. for me it does not take away any of the intuitive or inventive side be cause I still am designing as it were. I just do my development work in cyberspace instead of work space.

I build from my own designs and plans. All but one of my designs are "inspired" by other shapes but braced and built to my specs. My "SIG" is completely out of my head.
I've build one guitar from Martin D plans (the client wanted a martin D guitar) and I had a commission to build a kit for a client that watched the video and couldn't do it.
The good news is that my guitars sound much better than both the kit and the Martin plan guitar. So I guess I'm doing Something right.

All of my guitars are variations on historical guitars a few changes but the same basic shape and bracing.

I've used published plans for the general shapes. I've been liberal as to modifying bracing as well as depth and soundhole dimensions.

_________________
JJ
Napa, CA
http://www.DonohueGuitars.com

Dave,

I build from published plans (so far). I am an absolute novice at building an instrument, so I feel that starting with plans someone else has created increases my chances of building a good one. So far I have used the LMI Dreadnaught plans. Coming up next will be Michael Payne's SJ (just started building the for for this one). I also have Siminoff's mandolin book with the F5 plans, though I think it will be a few months before I get to that.

_________________
53% of all statistics are made up on the spot
http://driftwoodguitars.blogspot.com/

Dave, like many others I started with a plan and followed it fairly rigorously on my second guitar (my first from a Stew Mac kit) After that, well they just sort of evolved. Bit longer here, bit fatter there, more curvy on that bit type of thing, and the bracing pattern is always my own. For most of them I just drew round my 00,000,OM Martins and changed them to suit me (of course I know better than Martin!). I build just for myself so I have a very picky customer who is never happy with my end product.

Colin

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

I do both. Custom shapes as well as existing designs.

I would do more custom work if I felt more comfortable with CAD. That is a skill I desperately crave, but it seems to require a big time investment to come up to speed on the software.

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

For my first guitar I stuck to the plans in the Cumpiano book quite closely. For my second guitar I've been looking at few different plans of a few different builders, but I'm just using them for a general idea and will customize things as I go.

Thanks

I mostly use plans, but vary things to suit myself. So far things have turned out pretty well.

Like Brock, I would love to get my skills good enough to use CAD to do my design work. I have several versions of CAD and so far haven't been able to get very good at any of them.

And I had to take several CAD courses while I was in college. Just can't remember anything I learned that far back.

_________________
Dave Rector
Rector Guitars

Still on my first one but it is my own design. I have a bunch of different plans but I just use them to get general shapes and sizes to ensure that custom shapes will still fit into standard cases. I was going to follow the Cumpiano plan for the first but was talked out of it by a builder friend of mine. I don't think you need CAD to do your own shapes. I just drew it out full size on kraft paper, nech and all, and then pinned it up on my wall and looked at it over the next couple of months. A couple of minor adjustments and now it is almost ready for the top and back to be glued on. Very rewarding to know that these are unique designs.

Shane

_________________
Canada

Shane, I know that you don't really need CAD to do the drawings. It's just that my drawing skills are so bad that I like to be able to see it beforhand and make the changes rather than draw it all out by hand.

I can also get a lot more accuracy out of the CAD than I can from my pitiful attempts at freehand drawing.

_________________
Dave Rector
Rector Guitars

I absolutely agree Dave, I think that is just important to note that CAD shouldn't be considered a pre-requiste to custom shapes and designs. When you start looking at Bill N's and Craig's inlay work you immediately become humbled by the vast array of artistic skill out there. I grew up with my father who was a commercial artist. Both of my brothers are incredible artist's as well. Me, three thumbs!! But I have over the past few years just started to draw more using simple lines and just refining the lines as you go. As my friend told me, draw it and put it up where you can look at at it for about a month just to make sure that it is OK. I have an older version of AutoCAD but just haven't found the time to figure it out....maybe one day!

Shane

_________________
Canada

[QUOTE=Brock Poling]
I do both. Custom shapes as well as existing designs.

I would do more custom work if I felt more comfortable with CAD. That is a skill I desperately crave, but it seems to require a big time investment to come up to speed on the software.

[/QUOTE]
Brock If you need a q & a session on autocad let me know I would be glad to set some time on the weekends to help via chat if you like.

Give The OLF SJ or OM plans a try. I think you will like either shape and find the plans themself to be very good.

The real tricky part of designing your own shape is getting a good (inexpensive) case for it. So I would think this is why most of us use a historical shape for our designs and have the odd one be something completely different.

As far as bracing goes, I just wing it based on what I've seen over the years, based on common designs of course, just tweaking it a little.

That's what I love about guitar building, it's an art with some well set out parameters.

As far as the cad subject goes, I have 10 years of cad experience and the best feature, I think, for using it to design guitars is the ease of copying to tweak the design. Oh, and also to design the jigs and machinery for this great art form of ours.

_________________
My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

I've built only my own designs over the years, but lately--say the last 10 years--I've been developing more of an appreciation for the "old standards".
Martin, for instance, can really finesse a curve. (Ok, the dreadnought excepted.) To go one's own way can be risky, in that those old standards are the touchstone against which our work is inevitably compared.
Like Shane, I revisit my designs now and then, but I find that 2 months isn't enough. At least for me. I'm getting perspective now that has taken a decade. So I look at one of my designs now, and think: "what was I thinking?" And old Mr. Martin is doing that to me! Isn't that the definition of a classic? Something about standing the test of time.

Anyway, one can learn a lot from at least studying a plan, and like Colin said, making little adjustments here and there.

Steve Steve Kinnaird38678.587962963

_________________
From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

Whenever I design a guitar I have found that like Steve, I look at it sometime later and say, Hmm musta been a bad day. I always leave a drawing hanging around for a time and when a few weeks go by without making any changes, I consider that it is getting close. I too have several guitar designs that make me wonder what I was thinking. It is ovious though that those who have been making guitars for centuries like martin/gibson and such did develope an eye for these shapes. Though I do make some guitars of my own design I have learned that the standards are real hard to beat and the best of my own are very close to those that are my inspiration.

_________________
Tickle your guitar daily, and it'll tickle you back.

I build classicals, which by their nature are much more constrained in terms of body design than steel string acoustics.

The first couple of guitars I built were from a set of Hauser plans, but I soon grew tired of this. The guitars sounded very good, but I did not decide to learn how to build guitars only to imitate others. Rather, I decided to learn the craft so I could experiment and explore.

For example, two of my early builds were radical departures from traditional classicals. I developed a 17-fret-to-the-body design, which involved a severely truncated upper bout. The first of these two guitars had 24 frets, twin soundholes, an adjustable bridge, and lattice bracing. It sounded pretty good, but not enough like a classical. So the next one of these I built was a traditional classical in every way, except for the 17-fret neck and the truncated upper bout. Quite to my surprise, it sounded amazing. I never would have known this if I hadn't built it.

In another respect, even though classicals may appear outwardly the same, actually they have more variation in terms of soundboard bracing patterns than steel string acoustics have. This is another area to which I turned with considerable interest, and by my sixth build, I had developed a bracing pattern that I thought might just have possibilities. Well, that guitar and others I've built since using the same pattern have turned out very well. So well, in fact, that I have standardized on this bracing scheme. I have built guitars with other bracing styles since developing this design, but it was either to investigate a particular build philosophy, or because a client requested a particular pattern.

Lastly, even though classicals appear more or less the same, there are real differences in appearance to the practiced eye. My guitars may look similar to other classicals, but the body shape is uniquely mine.

I think this sort of progression is natural, and good. People start off by imitating the best examples of the art. Then after they become comfortable with it, they begin to reach out and expand, eventually developing their own design, hence their own style and, most importantly, their own sound.

Best,

Michael

_________________
Live to Play, Play to Live

I always do my own designs, or at least my own interpretations. I don't much like most 'classic' Martin shapes all that much (the flatness around the heel and at the tail is what bothers me), so I've never been tempted to go build one. Who knows, my tastes may change, but I'm not counting on it. I always draw up my own stuff, and leave it hanging on a wall for a good while. Occasionally walk by, draw little notes on it, whatever. When I've scribbled on it enough, cut out the shape, trace it onto a fresh sheet, and repeat the process. I keep doing this until I'm fairly certain it is where I want it to be, and then I go make a template.

I've only ever built two guitars following the same template (my two acoustics), but I will be re-using some of my electric tempaltes, probably after a tiny bit of modification (I've built too few to consider myself as having a 'standard' model).

Then again, I am planning on making one or more F5 style mando's at a some point, simply because, gaudy or not, they just work to my mind. Might redesign one once I get a feel for the instruments, but they're not instruments I suspect I'll build huge numbers of. Flattop mandos, on the other hand, do absolutely nothing for me.

Brock and Dave R., I've yet to get the full version, but I really like my demo of DeltaCad. I found it to be very user friendly and, despite the fact that I have not bought the complete package, yet, it's very inexpensive!

_________________
DES - Shepherd, MI

Darin, I picked up a copy of TurboCad a while back for something like $8.95. It is one or 2 revs behind the current, but still will do everything I need it to do.

You can find it prety cheap at nothingbutsoftware.com.

_________________
Dave Rector
Rector Guitars