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My guitar will be a parlor guitar in its dimensions, but will have a shape I came up with that's different from the traditional shape.

Something old: For the old scrap or scrounged part, I'll be using a block of lignum vitae I inherited from my wife's grandfather via her mother who gave it to me thinking I might want to use it in a guitar. He was a marine engineer in one of the ship yards here in Seattle almost a hundred years ago. Lignum vitae had a number of uses in ship components and he had saved a block of it. I'm thinking of using it for the head plate, and possibly the end graft. For another "something old component", although not scrap or scrounged exactly, I'm going to try my hand at inlaying ammonite fossils (more than 65 million years old) into the fretboard as fret markers. Credit for the idea goes to forum member Patch Rubin who has done this on his guitars.

Something new: This will be my first parlor guitar, my first use of reversed kerfed lining, and my first maple neck. I also have an idea for a modern take on a slotted headstock, but I'll have to try making a mockup first to see if I can make it will work.

Something local: The main woods have a West Coast US theme. Redwood from northern California for the top, Claro walnut from southern Oregon for the back and sides, and big leaf maple from Washington for the neck.

For the "choose two" part, I'll be building a parlor under the price cap.

Specs:
Top: Redwood
Back & Sides: Claro Walnut
Neck: Big Leaf Maple
Binding: Bloodwood
Fretboard: Indian Ebony
Headplate: Lignum Vitae

Lower Bout: 13"
Waist" 7.5"
Upper Bout: 9"
Length: 18"
Depth 3.5-4.0"
Scale Length: 24.75"


I haven't decided what to do for purfling or the rosette design yet. I like the idea of making a rosette from spruce bark like the one Grant Goltz showed in this thread: http://luthiercom.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=71&t=3384. If I can scrounge a suitable chunk of spruce or maybe Ponderosa pine bark, I'll give it a shot.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

I drew up the body shape in the G-Thang design program a couple weeks ago and got it printed out and then turned it into a template. I finished making the body form last week.




The major materials:

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

That's some pretty Claro! I like the shape too!

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

I got some sides-related stuff done over the past few days. Bending this claro walnut went really easy. Now I'm ready to drive the bus.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Sometimes I wonder why I ever build with anything other than walnut

Wow, driving the bus already! Looking good. At this rate, this thing will already be played in by the time winter sets in.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

I'm trying to make some quick progress now while the finish on another guitar is curing. This guitar will have to get set aside starting next week while I do the final assembly of the other one.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

I really like that walnut. Gonna make a pretty guitar!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I drove the bus yesterday and then pre-bent the reverse kerfed lining the way that Ken Cierpilowski shows on his web site by wetting the webbing side with water, clamping it to the outside of the rims, and then letting it dry in place. Worked great. I got the linings installed today. I had read that the reverse linings make the sides more rigid, but I was shocked, shocked I tell you, at just how solid the sides are with these linings. I like it.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

I have some progress to add. I got the top and back plates joined, and the braces made and ready to go for gluing when I have time.

I also started playing around with hunks of bark gathered from fallen trees in local woods to see if I can use it to make a rosette ring. Some barks reveal pretty cool patterns when sanded. So far, I've tried Douglas fir, hemlock, and cottonwood. I flattened them by steaming with a laundry iron and then pressing under weights. I killed our 15+ year-old iron in the process. I then ran them through the thickness sander. The main problem with these three species is that the bark has deep fissures making it impossible to get a large enough sanded area to make an entire ring as one piece. A segmented rosette would probably be the way to go. All three make some interesting patterns that are characteristic of each tree as far as I can tell, but they are also quite variable from one hunk of bark to another.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

I really like the way reversed kerfed linings stiffen up the sides, and solid laminated linings work even better, at least until the plates go on.
I hope you can make some of that bark work as inlay, it's unique.

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

Now that another guitar I was working on is finished, I finally have some progress to report.

I picked up where I left off seeing if I can make a rosette ring from bark. Since this guitar is going to end up belonging to my daughter, it occurred to me that I might be able to make the rosette a sort of memento for her. She has been going to a summer camp in South Puget Sound ever since she was 8 years old (now 21) and has spent the last three summers off from college working as a councilor at the camp. It's a very special place for her so I asked her to scavenge in the woods at camp, which there are lots of, for any big chunks of bark she might be able to send my way. She came back with a backpack full of pieces including hemlock, Doug fir, and a couple others. The most promising one turned out to be a big hunk of Doug fir:



After a couple runs through the thickness sander to take a peek inside:



I ran it through the band saw and ended up with these four thin slabs.



This is the piece that ended up producing a usable ring:



Routing the ring




The final ring on the redwood top. I think it'll look good with purfling around it.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Nice ring, Jay!

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

I like that rosette ring!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

This morning, I was looking at the other rosette ring I had routed yesterday which I had rejected because of a bad area on one side of the ring when I realized that the bad spot can be positioned under the end of the fretboard extension. So now I have two rings to choose from.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

That's just fantastic!

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Second one looks best to me, I like the darker colors.

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

I agree and so does my daughter. The second one it is.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

You can send me the first one so it doesn't go to waste

I'm glad you like it, but I'm pretty sure it won't go to waste.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Beautiful! I prefer the first one, but they're both excellent so it really doesn't matter which you use for this guitar. Love the story behind it, too

The Doug fir bark rosette and the soundhole binding are now in. The soundhole binding is bloodwood which is what the body and fretboard binding will be.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

That's going to look really good under finish.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Made some progress today. Soundhole cut out, body outlines cut out for the top and back, and surfaces thoroughly sanded. I had planned to put in a bloodwood backstrip to match the binding, but I decided I like the bookmatched joint too much to disrupt it. It doesn't show in the photo, but the fine grain patterns in the redwood top are very cool.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Looking very nice JDR.
Those colours look like they will come together very nicely.
Rosette is super nice of course.

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Wake up and smell the rosewood!