Official Luthiers Forum!

Thanks she's cool. Picked her up several months ago, hung her on the wall, called up Lindy (Frailin) and ordered his pups, installed them and now it's a great ax! Everyone has to have a Tele. This is my first ever Tele. I have my eye on a Suhr Tele but you have to wait 6 months to get one....

Sorry Hesh, mistaken identity - didn't see your tele, which is nice, but I was actually referring to mountain whimsy's thinline.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Where do I start?
So I have one commission that’s being shipped to Japan it’s a Stella parlor guitar. - Adi and flame birch
I have a stella jumbo deep body long scale six string with some really nice purfling I had custom made in Germany.
then there’s another stella jumbo 12 string.
A J - 200 Adirondack Redspruce and quilted maple
There’s a Brazilian Rosewood dreadnought with Brazilian Rosewood binding, head veneers, fretboard and bridge.
A “Presentation” single 0 Cuban Mahogany with mother of pearl trim

Then in the repair department I have a 1910 Martin I forget what model it is but it’s rare from what I understand it’s a mess!
Top is peeling off at most of the top braces are loose the fretboard it’s about 1/8 of an inch thick.
The ivory binding is missing 3/4 of it on the top. Surprisingly the Brazilian Rosewood back and sides are in pretty much perfect condition not a single split and the finish is in decent shape…
And the usual repair work fret jobs, neck resets,refinishing a couple of gold tops etc.
















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Brad wins.

Thanks, that makes me feel really good,because I never win at anything!

Agreed!! Wow Brad you have a lot going on, very cool!!!

I love seeing the stuff you are working on Brad!

Nice Brad. I made a violin with flamed birch. The flame was ridiculously deep. That bluish stuff is pearl? Very nice. I'm thinking of thinner Paula abalone on my next violin. Not very kosher. But it isn't traditional either.

I need to by a new cello top, but I think I'll get some guitar tops at the same time. I have all sorts of things started, so I'll finish up the easy ones. A tiny baroque guitar in A that will be a 8 string uke. It is from plans for Voboam guitars that I have. Very fancy French things. It has a lot of inlay. The next step after making a bridge, is to put the fancy inlay on the ribs and then bend them. I had to alter the plans of the inlay from the model in E to this tiny thing in A.



I made up new drawings of violins and violas. The basement is cold! Ok for roughing. A luthier in Japan posted about his New Concept violin. It sounds like what you guys call a hybrid. It has a thin, bent top, curved ribs, and a back that is curved on the bottom just like the top is curved, but the opposite way. I decided to make that, because it is so different. But I have no pictures; he didn't post any. The belly will be bent lengthwise over the ribs, and a low cross arch bent into that. The bass bar will be a diagonal, from one end to the other, on my arch line. The other diagonal will only go to the middle, or maybe a little past. The sound post area won't have braces. I don't know about other bracing. It is about 2 mm think now. Everything about this part is up in the air.

Built it, test it, tap it, call it good.





The P O Cedar and cherry I had sitting around. Making a back with a curved bottom is interesting. I did the curve first, and then rough out the inside arch. I always do the inside first. then the outside gets the edges roughed down, and the long arch roughed. I use radii. this one is pretty flat, 1200mm. It's all 6-7mm thick now, but it is only rough. Then you can work on the inside and the outside to get what you want. It should be fun. If I get bored, I can cut and glue veneer.

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Why be normal?

Hey Ken. How do you intend to finish the cherry back? I am almost finished with an F5 mandolin with cherry back and sides and I was wanting to "practice" varnishing the mandolin traditionally before I get to varnishing a violin.

Curious and thanks.

Gary

Hi Ken,
An Idea that has been rolling around in my mind for the last couple of decades has been to build a Savart style trapezoid violin using thin bent plates instead of the flat plates he used. My thinking is it would be almost as easy to construct, allow for a less tall bridge than he used and possibly make bowing easier. I guess it's still on the "list"

Gary, I did a cherry 5 string a couple years ago, and just used the oil varnish that I make. Oil and resin boiling in a pot until it is done.Add turpentine. It is a smelly, smoky mess. I used most of my ingredients up now The wood does have some flame, and a lot of luster, so I don't want to lose that. The oil varnish came out great on that, and would be good. But I did a Padauk and P O Cedar violin, and it is still hanging there undone because the varnish just went meh on the cedar, and the Aquacoat that looked good on its own on the Padauk made the varnish over top look bluish and glassy. With just the sealer it looked nice. A dud.



But I did a Padauk guitar with Oslo oil finish, and I love the way it came out, It is also the easiest finish I've worked with. So I'll probably use that. The gloomy light coming in the east window now is perfect for photos!




Clay. You are getting a bit sketchy there, aren't you? I do that a lot too!

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Why be normal?

Wow. They are both beautiful. Did you use only clear varnish on the 5-string or did you add any color along the way?

Gary

The varnish is very dark in the bottle, but on a thin coat it looks amber.

It's taken a while to not wreck an instrument with varnish! But I still did on that one last year. The varnish I made up last summer is the same color wise, but I like the viscosity a lot better. I like to rub it on with fingers, but the last ones were too thick and sticky. I made a bunch of varnish last year. The other jar is full to the top.I think I added some Azo green oil paint on the five string. It cuts the orange down like using a complementary color; like a shadow, so it isn't so bright.

I used that color with Zpoxy, and it does wonderful things with that. Try it first, it will surprise you. Takes the very light amber to almost orange. By adding a yellow green.Go figure. I only use a bit on the end of a toothpick. I never use very much varnish.For the poxy guitar I mixed that in those small plastic medicine cups. I mix glue up a 1/4 teaspoon of glue to 1 teaspoon of water. That will glue violin/viola halves together, or guitar braces, bellies or backs on.

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Why be normal?

Thanks Ken. I'm all ears if you wish to share anything else.

Gary

Well, I'm certainly not anyone to emulate! I'm better at design and vision. But vision with the eyes, as in fine details? That's not me at all. I'm the one who needs a varnish guy, and a setup guy.
But thanks anyway.

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Why be normal?

I have a new addition to my shop. It came time to install frets on the current instrument. The old fret nipper I have is fussy. I can make it work, but only if I hold it just right and nibble in the from the tang end making three or four small cuts per tang end. I had been thinking of trying out the newer StewMac fret nipper but happened across one of the old OLF threads with examples of tang grinder setups people here have built for the job. So, I decided to give it a go and built a fixture out of scrap wood to hold my Dremel.

I used it for the first time today and hallelujah! It works great. Nice clean, accurate tang removal and no more damaged fret ends. And it's way faster getting through the whole set of frets than it was with the nipper.

It's made mostly from scrap 3/4" ply. The surface with the slot for feeding the fret into the grinding wheel is radiused at 7" which is about the radius of the coiled fretwire I buy. I like that the business end is about 10" above the benchtop. It makes it easy to see what's happening without having to bend over.

The top plate that the Dremel hangs from is a separate piece that pops off the fixture so it's easy to install and remove the Dremel. The Dremel is mounted in a StewMac router base which gives very fine adjustment for the height of the grinding wheel.

I'm running the Dremel through a momentary switch in a floor pedal which means it's on only right when I need it and I don't have to futz with turning the Dremel power switch on and off between each fret. Speeds things up too.

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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

Cool, I use a half round file OO and zip zam, three hits and the tange is toast. Takes about 1.5674389 seconds for each fret

Love it when Cool things arrive in the shop. Don’t see these too often around here.

Very cool old geetar Josh. This one was built when guitars had trouble being heard over the rest of the band.

Cool pick-up and knobs too, early guitar electronics for sure.

Starting finish work on this one:

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

Drool worthy.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I also made it to the spray booth this morning…





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Insta - https://www.instagram.com/cbcguitars/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cbcguitars

Is that walnut Chris Ensor?

Working on a curly white oak and lutz OOish 12 fret.


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Bryan Bear PMoMC

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

Bryan, those are some slick side splints incorporated fully into the laminated linings.
Also like the headblock extending into the huge UTB...