Official Luthiers Forum!

I trimmed the wings and got the back braces roughed out. I'm not sure I'm sold on my rosette and position markers, if the holly doesn't really make a difference I'll have to rethink that design.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I finished up cutting out the molds and forms. One wall of my shop is decorated with the grandkids artwork from when the were younger.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Swapped out the blade on the big bandsaw and cut the taper on the center laminate of the neck. I'm going to have to figure out some kind of humidity control before I can close the box.
I should get the neck glued up and sides bent this weekend, if the furniture project doesn't take up too much time,

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I made a little more progress this weekend, but not as much as I had hoped. I thicknessed the fingerboard to just over 1/4", then used the drum sander to rough in the radius.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I glued up and trimmed up the neck blank, marked the fretboard for slotting and roughed out the bridge.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Now for bending the sides. My homemade bender was less than $20, and hey, it works!
Between the light bulbs on the inside and the clothes iron on the outside, it works pretty good. This bloodwood really didn't want to bend, even at less than 0.07" thick. Springback is really bad, I've heated it up a couple more times and left it overnight. I'll see how it is when I get home tonight, but I'm sure I'll be able to get it in the mold.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I don't have any photos to post cause I haven't done anything in the last couple of days, at least nothing on this guitar!
I've got a 3 day weekend and high hopes. I won't be going to the race, but I will have it on the TV while I'm working.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Rodger that bloodwood looks good. The neck looks great also. I don't think I'll be going anywhere near the city this weekend. Traffic will be a mess.

_________________
Kyle

mmmmmmmmm Bloodwood cake with BRW frosting

I do like the look of that bloodwood. The combo with the maple is going to be sweet. Actually, it will look like a red velvet cake.

OK, I guess I figured out how to post a .pdf, so here's my final accounting:
There's more up-to-date info on the preamp components, this is the part numbers and prices from when I built the preamps.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Here's the schematic and board design of the preamp.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

It's been a while since I posted photos, so some of these are a couple of weeks old. Here's some more shots of the bending operations.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Someone posted!!!. Been a bit quiet around here the last few days, guess everyone's been busy with other stuff, like me.

_________________
Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I've been forgetting to bring my camera in to the office, that's my story and I'm sticking to it!
I got the heel and tail blocks (heal and tale? ) shaped up and glued to the sides. The linings are all glued in and came out pretty decent, there's a couple of very small gaps in the waist area that I'll let go.
For this one, my laminated kerfless lining consists of four 1/16" thick strips of oak, the first two are 3/8" wide and the second two are 1/4" wide. I use the smaller binding clips for gluing on the first two, then move up to the larger clips for the second two.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Reading back through my earlier posts, I found a mistake. This is actually a Gibson L-00, not an LG-0. My plans are based on the Grellier plans that everybody uses. If anyone is interested in my adaptations, I can post the plans in .pdf format. I'd probably put them on 2 sheets 24"x36".
I've decided to scrap my original position marker and rosette design. I worked for several hours fitting the pieces for one rosette segment, and there's ten segments. I'm still not satisfied with the fit, and the appearance is not spectacular enough to justify the effort, so I'm going with something less elaborate.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I have some concerns about this piece of redwood being suitable for a top. It's pretty floppy, but it is extreamly light. I'm also a little concerned by a thread about braces peeling off of redwood, especially since I'll be using a pinless bridge. I'm doing a test with the offcuts from the top, if the glue joints hold OK I'll be using the top. I'm quite anxious to see this under finish, the redwood and bloodwood should look spectacular.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I finished inlaying the rosette.
I still need to level up the rosette and finish sand the top, I've decided I'm going to use this top but I'm not going to thin it any more than necessary. My testing showed that this redwood should hold braces fine, I couldn't pull the scrap of spruce from the offcut of the top. I sort of assumed I could pull it loose, even if it was a good glue joint. I was wrong!
I slotted the fretboard.
I decided to use my "standard" position markers, I've used this design more than once so I guess that makes it my standard. Those are all cut out and ready to inlay, and the board is marked and ready to taper.
Here's the rosette and the fretboard.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

My next step is installing the preamp. I've glued in maple reinforcing patches where the preamp and output jack will go.
You can also see the redwood side reinforcments I made from offcuts of the top.
Next up will be drilling the mounting holes and cutting the slots in the side for the preamp controls.
I believe I have a chance of finishing on time!

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Hey nice fret saw
I think your wood choices are going to look really nice together; I'm glad your keeping the redwood top. What is the roll of weed trimmer line for?

_________________
Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

For my weed trimmer, of course! That coffee table serves all kinds of functions. My trimmer uses one of those double spools and the refills are about $8 each. I've got 3 spools that I rewind off the big spool, which also cost about $8. I'll get 20 or 30 rewinds out of the big spool. There's an empty spool waiting to be rewound, that's why it's on the table. Call me cheap if you want to

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

I'm in no position to call you cheap, I only have one spool that I re-wind. . . I was hoping there was some sort of funkey cool nylon strung electric bass comming up in the future.

_________________
Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Nice looking wood. Glad you are sticking with the redwood top. I like it a lot.

_________________
http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

I've finished installing the preamp and inlaying the position markers, but the photos I shot are all out of focus.
I'll shoot them again before I post them.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Here's some better photos of the preamp installation.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon

Here's some photos of the fingerboard.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon