After a bit of time re-establishing the routine with getting kids to school and doing homework with the kids, I got back in the shop. I had left off finishing the install of the binding and purfling on guitar 3′s body. I had done a little clean up and wanted to finish that up. I [...]
Posts under ‘Woodworking’
Guitar 3 has been bound!
Today, I’ll show you a little about how I improved my binding and purfling install. Below you can see that the first half is finished. Before finishing the 2nd half, you need to square up the ends so that you can get a flush joint. In my case, I usually overextend the glue joint for [...]
It’s a good day!
Today was a good day! I decided to try a new approach to the initial glue up. In the previous glue ups, I run into a problem that the purfling is not pre-bended (it’s just too thin to even try) while the binding is pre-bended. This aggravates the nature of thin pieces of wood getting [...]
Less Swearing…
I got back to my shop yesterday and returned to working on building 3 guitars. The step I’m on (installing purfling and binding) is not fun and actually quite frustrating. Yesterday, I was swearing a lot. In fact my wife, Kathy, came out to check on me. I’ve broken the job down into 4 installs [...]
Back To Work
A few hours ago I got back to my shop. As many of you might know, my current project (or projects) involve building 3 guitars from scratch. To date, I’ve built 3 bodies which include 2 with cutaways and 1 with full body. I’ve roughed 3 necks out including the headstock. Right now, I’m working [...]
Motivated or Frustrated
I haven’t been to my shop in a few weeks. To me (and probably most of us woodworkers), that’s just sad. The problem, though, may be self inflicted. Those of you who have read this blog on a regular basis know that I’m working on building 3 acoustic guitars. If you really remember a while [...]
School Project for Mitchell
I’ve been sick and a bit frustrated about my last shop session so I haven’t been in the shop for a bit but today would get me back there. All week long, my youngest son, Mitchell has been telling me about this project that his teacher said they can do. It’s a “Stoolie”. I told [...]
Purfling…what a funny word!
Purfling is a word that defines material between the binding and the top or back wood on a string instrument. Binding is a word that defines the outer most material surround the top and back wood on a string instrument. The purfling is decorative but the binding actually provides some function. First the binding provides [...]
Guitar Building – Back at it!
It’s been a while since I worked on my guitars. Now it’s time to get back to it (not that I’ve exhausted all my distractions but really…I need to finish these babies!). On the right you see my second guitar body. I had already finished the purfling and binding though I don’t consider it a [...]
Sharpening – Why oh why?
As I mentioned in my last post, I decided to refresh my blades throughout my shop. The hand plane blades took me 2 days and then sharpening the chisels took another day. All of that wasn’t really a problem. The real problem is why can’t I get into the rhythm of sharpening when I sense [...]
Sharpening – Hand Planes
I try to sharpen frequently so that I don’t have a big couple of days getting everything sharp but sometimes it’s just time to clean house. I decided after 2 shop projects and a bunch of guitar building that it was time to do that house cleaning. First, I started with my hand planes. I [...]
Rip Saw Bench
Over the last few days, I decided to build another saw bench. I have already built 2 in the Christopher Schwarz style. I’ve found these saw benches to be absolutely great…except for ripping. The flared legs get in the way when ripping, especially a narrow board. So I needed something that didn’t have flared legs [...]
Introducing – my Wall Hanging Tool Chest
I did some sanding and hardware installation. Getting the doors hung square and even with one another took quite a few re-do’s. I probably spent more than an hour on it to get the door hang just right. I also put on nice wood knobs and some magnetic catches. I’m super pleased with the way [...]
Doors almost done
Yesterday was a good day. I got to make lots of shavings. I always tell my wife when I’ve had a good day that “I got to cut wood”. Of course it sounds a bit juvenile but the fun I’m having doing woodworking lately is very kid like so I’m ok with that. I started [...]
Panel for doors
After my last post, I had a nice fail and didn’t correctly determine the length of the rails for the doors. The old adage of measure twice and mark once only works if you have decided the length of a particular item correctly. For this project, I’m not using a plan so my determination was [...]
