When installing a rosette into a guitar top, you need to make sure that you’ve got an accurate measurement of the guitar top. In my case, my guitar top is 3 1/2 mm thick. This means that when you cut out the channel or groove for the rosette, you need to cut no more than [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Glue’
Guitar 2 – Disaster Averted
With the terrifying news coming out of Japan, it’s hard to call my mishap with glueing on the top a disaster but in the scope of the project, it could have been. After the clamps came off, I was able to take the splits (all three of them) off and save them. I then trimmed [...]
Guitar 2 – Glue Up Disaster
Have you ever experienced going through a project where things seem to be going well but something is nagging at you … and then some disaster happens and you figure out what is nagging at you? Well, today that happened to me. I’m working on getting the top ready for glue up. To do this, [...]
Review Guitar Building State
OK, I’ve been focused on some home improvement items that have kept me out of the shop. Let’s get back to it with a quick review. I have 3 guitars in progress (#2, 3, and 4). #2 and #4 are cutaways. #3 is a full body guitar. They all have spruce tops with maple sides, [...]
Clamped the Top
Over the weekend, I took the top that I’ve been working on and glued it on. I think that my technique is getting better. I was better at trimming the various braces and the notches in the kerfing to get the top to fit. It was a very tight fit. I’ve signed the inside of [...]
More Bracing Work
After the X-braces that I talked in the previous post, I needed to work on the other braces and get them glued and clamped. I’ve reviewed books and videos and have determined (especially for the x-brace) that some other shaping should be done before I glue it up to get even tighter joints. Also, I [...]
X-braces for the top
When making the top, you need to find the center line (isn’t this a running theme in all the pieces of the body?) and then use your plans to layout the braces. My plans came from LMII (I have both a set of paper plans and a plastic, re-usable template for the orchestra sized body). [...]
Guitar 4 – Alignment looks good
Today, I took the back with the braces and joined it to the sides. I first had to finish shaping the braces and then create the slots in the kerfing for the braces. All this was exactly the same for guitars 2 and 3. I spent a great deal of time during glue up getting [...]
Keeping Busy on 2 Guitars
Today, I got to unclamp the body of my 3rd guitar. The joint is very flush and I’m happy with that. I’m disappointed with my ability to align the back to the sides. This is where I’m supposed to take the center line of the back and line it up with the center line on [...]
Guitar #3 gets Sides joined to Back
Today, I worked on attaching the sides and back together. The first step is to shape the braces on the back. About 550mm from the edge of the guitar, the braces are pared down to about 2-4mm thickness. Once that is done, you determine where to cut the cross braces and the center brace so [...]
Lots of Little Things
Today was a day where I got a lot of little things done. First, I needed to start working on the backs to attach to the sides that I have prepped. The first step is to glue a center brace down the center line of the back. Next, I had a chip out on the [...]
Sides are done
The sides are done for both body 3 and body 4 guitars. You can see body 3 which is the orchestra sized body with no cut away and body 4 which is also an orchestra sized body but with a cutaway. The kerfing installed nicely and I did have more glue squeeze out (meaning I [...]
No Cut Away Body – Kerfing Glue Up
I almost wasn’t going to do this post but after how simple it was, I thought I would note a few things. This (body 3) is the first full body (no cut away) that I’ve installed kerfing on. My first guitar was a kit and the kerfing was already installed. A cutaway guitar only has [...]
Kerfing installed – body four
I’ve decided to keep my 3 guitar’s in progress straight that I want to term them. The guitar I’ve been working on for the last few days has been body 4. This is an orchestra sized guitar with a cut away. See the previous post on how I prepared the kerfing. The installation went great. [...]
New Kerfing Installation Technique
Kerfing is such a weird word. If you look at a guitar, the sides, back and top are all made of a very thin piece of wood. If you think about glueing the top or back to the sides, there really is no strength there and it would probably not hold up in normal guitar [...]
