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Yes. Right at the fret hours. ???


Posted using letters to form words, sentences and thoughts.

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http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

Assuming hours means board the answer is yes. I needed a shallow flat bottom hole so I took an old 3/4" forstner bit and re-profiled it, put some tooth on the wood and the T-Nuts, then epoxied them in. There are two nuts because the truss rod runs between them so I suppose one nut would work if you adjusted the truss rod at the nut. Personally I prefer having no truss rod cover on acoustics (although I do have a cool way to attach them without having hardware showing).

James Condino recommended I use this method when we had a discussion about a butt-joint neck at our last luthier's meeting. I was not pleased with my earlier graphite-reinforced floating fretboard extension since the notes played up there were pretty dead. I figured that the notes were dead because the node was allowed to vibrate since there wasn't enough solid structure under the extension. I mentioned it sucked that you had to glue the extension and wouldn't be able to just pull the neck like I could on my other bolt-on design (Doolin-type adjustable). So James recommended bolting the extension on with something like T-Nuts.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I'm not sure how autocorrect got hours from board.?. I hope my woodworking is better than my typing/proofreadig. I had forgotten about the truss rod. I guess when I steal this it will be two T-nuts. . .

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Hours, board, who cares! It's a cool method of attaching the fb extension so that it is removable.


Posted using letters to form words, sentences and thoughts.

_________________
http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

The auto correct function on the IPhone gets me all the time.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Spent a few hours in the shop today and got the box closed, put in the frets, and glued in the truss rod and filler strip.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

More progress today:

A side-by-side shot to show the top and back bracing.


got the top glued on last night and parked it out of the way.


Box is together and it all fits. Box has a huge tap - loud and like a tight drum head. Just like I was hoping, so far so good.


Epoxied the fretboard.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Coming along nicely. I love it!

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Managed to get the neck shaped. Heel cap and binding are all I have left before finishing. I have three rehearsals this week and then playing two concerts on Sunday so I'll have to try to get it done in the mornings before work.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

That's a nice looking box and neck. I wish I could make nice looking boxes and necks and not punch them in the face.

_________________
http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

Binding not dun yet so I ain't sayin nuttin

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

No time for photos this morning but was able to get the binding channels cut.

Too busy last night - long rehearsal, too many actors/actresses.


Orchestra is behind a screen about 30' x 50' that they're using to project scenes. My view of the world when I have time to look over that way

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Moving along with the morning sessions - who needs sleep . I should be into final sanding this weekend and then start spraying this coming week. I've decided to do a water-based finish since I'm more comfortable with that and don't really have the time to work up a new finish schedule for the varnish I wanted to use.

Finished the heel cap


Cut the binding channels yesterday morning


I sure do like these Carruth scrapers . This is the mini version.


My very first attempt at mitered purflings - very fussy stuff. Fortunately the gaps look quite a bit worse in the photo than in real life so I think it will look ok when it is finished. I definitely need more practice. Next time maybe I should do long grain to long grain.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Looks pretty good. Mitered purfling is one of the things I am getting ready to try. I'm not sure I'm up to it yet though.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Just finished getting the bottom binding on. I've already scraped the top one so all I have to do is scrape the bottom one and do final scraping/sanding then it's off to finish. I ran out of blonde shellac and ordered some from StewMac - hopefully it'll be here Monday.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I wasn't sure about the BRW binding with the bubinga but I think I like it now.


I'm happy with the back; I used maple veneer for the purfling.


Tail wedge came out ok. I think it will look pretty good under finish

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Yes. It looks pretty nice with the BRW binding.

_________________
http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

Yep, the BWR and maple look good on it. It will look great under finish.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Thanks guys - we'll find out pretty soon!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Cleaned up the shop for finishing. A fellow OLF'r, Paul, dropped by today so got to talk guitars which I really like to do and see some things Paul is working on.

Got the first coat of Zpoxy done, hopefully 1 will be enough.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

That's a beauty, can't wait to hear it.

Thanks. I've reached the point where I'm getting excited to finish this one and see how it sounds too.

Got the Zpoxy sanded back; first time I used it and I like it. Then I finished prepping the parts and sprayed 2 coats of shellac. Got to use my new spray booth and Walcom HVLP gun for the first time. Also had the 3M PPG disposable cup system. Everything works great - what a treat to be able to shoot inside and even after dark. I would have been screwed today without it, it's been raining all day. The StewMac holder thing works real well too, lets me rotate everything in all directions to get a real even coat. I built my little booth based on Rod True's spray booth that he built in a corner of his shop (thanks Rod!).

I do need a note to self: remember to turn the gun upside down when removing the disposable cup - good thing it didn't have too much shellac left in it, I got a bit of a shellac shower.

Here's some IPhone camera photos. Sorry, left the good camera at the house.

EDIT: There are better resolution photos a few posts down.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

It's looking good Steve. Thanks for the tour of your shop on Saturday.

Thanks Paul. It's always fun to talk guitars, I'm looking forward to seeing how your EIR/Sitka build works out and I really liked the Tele body you brought by, I thought the finish looked great. Stop back by anytime

As far as my progress goes: 4 coats of PolyWhey and several light sandings done. Hope to level sand tonight then spray one or two wet coats for the final finish.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Ended up working in the shop Wed night - had to polish some display bezels for some new prototypes at work. Dang things were made from Delrin - that is really hard stuff to polish up. So I didn't get the level sanding done till last night which puts me a day behind schedule - and I don't have much slack

I've been using the new water-based poly (PolyWhey) from Vermont Coatings on this basically as a whim. I wasn't real happy with the flow out on the PolyWhey, it is pretty viscous, so I called Dan at Vermont Coatings to see what I might do. He sent me some spray recommendations but also agreed that thinning the product 5 to 10% with distilled water should be ok although I might need more coats. I added about 5% distilled water and sprayed one coat last night and the last 2 coats this morning. The flow-out was much improved and the resulting finish looked much smoother with less orange peel. This stuff builds up fast. Now I just need to let it cure for a week.

Also this morning I started making my strap button and pin from some Bastogne walnut. I'll post photos later.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"