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8 string acoustic


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If you need any advice on French polishing, I'm happy to help. This is a test piece done with about 30mins of work in a single session. Brummer rub-in grain filler (incomplete fill, not important), spirit dye (not dark enough) and 1-1/2lb cut shellac bodying. I'm sure you'll know as much as I do if you've done it before. French polishing seems to teach itself for the most part.

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Thanks mate, I'll take you up on that when the time comes. Truth be told I'm undecided on even what shade to go. I'd like to keep the top a nice contrast with the sides, but I'm guessing an amber would tie everything together nicely. Really wish I was more decisive.

Bricks were passed yesterday evening. Neck glue time. All seemed to go fine after after a few last bits of tweaking of the joint for angle. To save fiddling around I engaged both bolts, left loose, smeared a good dollop of epoxy into the join then cranked with gusto. Felt solid as a rock this morning. The fretboard went on this morning in a blizzard of hernia inducing clamps after a bar was routed and set bridging the neck/body join. Don't think this thing is going anywhere soon. There were a couple of small gaps when the board went on, but nothing significant that can't be filled.

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Last job of the day was to add the heel cap. I wanted to give the illusion with this that the binding was carrying on round the heel. Not sure how successful this was. Guess we'll see when the clamp comes off.

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haha nope. not nearly as clean as I'd like it to be.

Got up stupid early this morning as it was lovely and bright here. Doesn't happen often, but when id does it's glorious. So I set about the neck and I have to say I kind of just attacked it without marking up. With this kind of thing the more I think about it the more I panic. First I roughed out with a small spokeshave (currently tool de jour) carved in the volute thing then refind with a half round file. Almost there and yet to sand.

With the width of this neck I was worried that it would just turn out to be a flat rectangle. Happily I was wrong and its currently bordering on a nice chunky C shape. Ebony board left pretty square.  Time for a cuppa and a ponder on whether I want to take a bit more off.

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Well I'm now looking at a week of night shifts so I'm putting this this away until I've recuperated. This is where I'm leaving this - probably should have brushed off the dust first :D. First thing on the to do list when I'm back is to level and fret. the board. I also have to find a decent source of shellac and buy some cow bones (as  I've got a few builds in the offing decided to try and dry and degrease my own bone for saddles and nuts).

As always, thanks for reading.

Matt

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, not much to show for a weeks worth of kicking round the house. I've decided to try building a bending machine, so am awaiting a heat mat and slats from various places. In the meantime I wanted a set of 24 spool clamps for the next build and was a bit horrified at the price of some of them, not to mention shipping costs.  After nosing at the stewmac design I've come up with these. Threaded inserts in the handle and base, cork pads, c. 35mm oak dowels. c. 14x150mm max clamping depth. I'm 15 in, only another 9 to go and amazed at how much cheaper this has worked out. I'm a big fan of octagonal handles......WP_20170514_14_46_44_Pro.thumb.jpg.259b88371af2558a257318e294f9735f.jpg

Edited by 103801061982
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Yep, well sometimes they're good as long as you are conscious of the pressure they exert. I'm gradually losing grip strength in my hands so after hauling up say, 16 big heavy duty F-clamps I have little reserves left to add the vital last one. Or the one after that, etc. :D

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After hearing that same phrase year-in year-out, I have to disagree (which is my habit); you can never have enough of the right types of clamp. I'm quite in favour of these for F-clamps, however they soon get costly:

https://eshop.wuerth.de/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/WFS/1401-B1-Site/en_US/-/EUR/ViewCatalog-Browse?CatalogCategoryRef=14016017031002%40WuerthGroup-Wuerth-1401&SelectedFilterAttribut=%5B%5D&CatalogCategoryID=Kj8KD92ernMAAAFABAQdAR0M

....the fact that they are capable of putting out over 1000lbs of clamping pressure makes them worth the money. If the clamps are too weak to exert enough pressure, you end up having to put in dozens of the things to hit the numbers and close everything up. Go big. A few of those are better than all you can eat of the smaller types. So yeah, you can never have enough of the right tools clamps for the job.

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THis may a bit premature, but Ive started practicing cuts for the next one of these. This time around I'm going to try adding a cutaway and a couple of bevels. The plan is to angle the cutaway section to meet the heel flush and to further bevel. Perhaps an armrest bevel too. 

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Both bevels set at 25 degrees from the top. will lead to about a 10-15mm drop into the sides. Practice for today will be cutting the supports for the bevel's veneers. First off in offcuts of pine. The little saw grumbled a bit, but got almost there in the end. Pretty happy that I know how to do this, application is another thing entirely. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

So it turns out I cant be trusted to finish one before starting another, though at least I finished the clamps.

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Top and back joined for the cutaway guitar. Same basic design as the first, but with a cutaway, bevels and purfling on the back. I've to ditch the white veneer for purfling and cut maple stripes instead using a nicely flamed neck blank that's wide enough to lose a few mm.

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happiness is a sharp scraper, though my thumbs will have something to say about that tomorrow.

 

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So this is where this morning's tinkering got us. Bracing lattice for the back and a bit of an experiment. Thinner, lighter and taller than the first, but more coverage and therefore (hopefully) more support. The plan is to leave this at near enough the height it is. As the bracing is quite visible through the offset soundhole, perhaps I'll cap with some of the maple cut for purfling. 

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