Southpa Posted October 12, 2006 Report Share Posted October 12, 2006 I don't work on guitars (or wooden things in general for that matter) enough to warrant buying expensive planing equipment or large belt sanders. Can't afford it and don't have the space / facilities anyway. But if available I sure won't turn down the opportunity. Here is my trusty sanding table again being used for another function. The centerline of your guitar is one of the most important areas to "get right". A perfectly smooth flat surface with sharp corners on each opposing body half is crucial to avoid that obvious glue line down the center. I've glued 4 sheets of 40 grit paper to a perfectly flat table. I've used it for flattening the faces of guitar bodies before, does a nice job. In this case I clamped a piece of 3/8" thick angle iron to one side. The face of the iron has been smoothed and it is perfectly perpendicular to the surface of the table. The item to be sanded is then run along this "fence" and checked periodically with a carpenter's square. The end result is a nice, tight glue line between your 2 body halves. Yes, I admit all my guitars (this will be number 4, btw) have been built using various old fashioned techniques requiring lots of effort and VERY strict attention. Slip up once and you have even more work to do. But I get a lot of satisfaction out of my results. Also, these slow, painful methods are easier to control. When sanding like this its important to pay attention to what you are doing. Make sure you don't tilt the piece as your corner could get fried with only one swipe. Then you have to resort to a jack plane to bring things down to even again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NJD Posted October 13, 2006 Report Share Posted October 13, 2006 i have to joint my maple topcap today, i'm planning on clamping a straight edge to the stock and using my router bit to true it up... seems logical to me! we'll have to see if it works lol FINGERS CROSSED Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jammy Posted October 13, 2006 Report Share Posted October 13, 2006 Has everyone forgotten the merits of a good old hand plane? That's what I use to joint my acoustic tops, and my violin wedge. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
guitar2005 Posted October 13, 2006 Report Share Posted October 13, 2006 Has everyone forgotten the merits of a good old hand plane? That's what I use to joint my acoustic tops, and my violin wedge. A router and a straightedge is pretty fast and extremely accurate. I can joint an edge in 1min... and that includes installing the proper bit in the router. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mattia Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 Has everyone forgotten the merits of a good old hand plane? That's what I use to joint my acoustic tops, and my violin wedge. A router and a straightedge is pretty fast and extremely accurate. I can joint an edge in 1min... and that includes installing the proper bit in the router. This assumes, of course, that your straighedge is straight. I know mine is, but there's no way in hell I'm letting a router's base touch that. Machined to .002mm or something, ta very much. Handplanes are less noisy, just as effective, and oh so satisfying to use. Not that I don't sometimes joint with a router, but often as not, I grab one of my planes. Mmmm....planes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihocky2 Posted October 19, 2006 Report Share Posted October 19, 2006 I've tried to joint to pieces with a hand plane and just didn't have very good luck with it. I got them pretty close, but not right on. Then I switched to sandpaper on a flt table and a perpendicular fence. Some people, jsut aren't very good with hand planes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sexybeast Posted October 19, 2006 Report Share Posted October 19, 2006 I like the hand work, I trust it more than my machine work. I'm going to give this method a try. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Posted October 19, 2006 Report Share Posted October 19, 2006 Call me crazy, but I use my table saw to joint edges. Of course I use a nice expensive blade and it's required that the tool is set up right for it to work, but.. to each their own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
guitar2005 Posted October 20, 2006 Report Share Posted October 20, 2006 (edited) Call me crazy, but I use my table saw to joint edges. Of course I use a nice expensive blade and it's required that the tool is set up right for it to work, but.. to each their own. yup - Table saw works fine too but you need a fairly straight piece of wood to start with and it doesn't work well with larger height Edited October 20, 2006 by guitar2005 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thegarehanman Posted October 20, 2006 Report Share Posted October 20, 2006 Tablesaws are great. Until I get a thickness sander and a bandsaw that has better adjustments, I'll make wooden binding by setting the fence up about .08" from the blade, cutting the wood to just under its total thickness leaving about .02" thickness holding the binding strip to the board. I then break it off and quick clean up the edge on the belt sander. The tablesawn side ends up quite smooth and with a few hand swipes of 220 grit, you're ready to glue it on. Well, that's enough off topic rambling... peace, russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Posted October 20, 2006 Report Share Posted October 20, 2006 (edited) yup - Table saw works fine too but you need a fairly straight piece of wood to start with and it doesn't work well with larger height Depends how you do it. The wood I purchase is one side milled, so the other side is usually 95% straight. The 95% side follows the fence, knocking off the milled side. Then I go back over the 95% straight side. Thus making a perfectly straight body blank! I do not raise the blade higher than 2 5/8". I usually have to take it thru slower when it is this high to prevent the blade from shifting angle - the slow speed causes burn marks, so I avoid doing it this way. Edit: I must have been tired when I wrote this. That was incredibly hard to follow. Edited December 9, 2006 by Jon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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