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Post by lefranglais on Sept 13, 2019 8:39:28 GMT
Hello folks. I’m new around here A few years ago my nephew asked if I’d make him an acoustic guitar. He knew what he wanted; an OM with a cutaway. I was frankly less than enthusiastic. Why? Well, I made electric bass guitars, I made them for fun and I made them for me. That way, if the customer wasn’t satisfied… I was wary of making something to order, so to speak, that either he or I might be disappointed with. After all, the dreadnaught I made in 1971 was not really a success. It looked OK but it sounded crap (it still does)… and it didn’t have a cutaway. I have made an acoustic bass guitar which looks nice… but that didn’t have a cutaway either. And anyway I had already drawn plans for my next bass. But after I’d made that bass I didn’t have room for any more basses. And anyway, I fancied a change, so I decided to have a go. But I didn’t tell my nephew so if it turned out to be a clunker he wouldn’t know and wouldn’t be disappointed. By the way, this has already appeared on an American forum. The reason I’m regurgitating it here is that we moved house 18 months ago and, at the moment, I don’t have a workshop so I can’t show any work in progress As I was going to try to do the cutaway, I decide to throw in as many other bells and whistles as I could think of. So here we go Starting with the tail block which consists of a bit of mahogany (off-cut from a bass) and a bit of old-growth birch plywood.
Glued them together, stuck a print of the drawing to them and trimmed them to size.
I roughly cut out a hole in the tail block with a jigsaw, but it needs to be as perfectly smooth and circular as I can get it. So this stack of bits consists of 1. The tail block
2. A spacer with a larger hole in it
3. A carrier with a 5mm hole in the middle
4. A base with a 5mm hole in the middle.
If anyone is watching, this is my first attempt to post photos on this forum and they look rather small. I realize that you can click on them to enlarge them, but I've noticed other posts where the photos show up bigger. How do you do that?
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ocarolan
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Post by ocarolan on Sept 13, 2019 9:48:23 GMT
If anyone is watching, this is my first attempt to post photos on this forum and they look rather small.I realize that you can click on them to enlarge them, but I've noticed other posts where the photos show up bigger.How do you do that? Direct upload to the Forum isn't great, 'tis true, and puts a severe limit on how much can be uploaded. But, if you first upload your pics to a hosting site such as Imgur, Flickr etc, then that site will give you the opportunity to post pics here at whatever size you wish. This might help if you need it - www.acousticsoundboard.co.uk/thread/5422/posting-photos-on-forum Btw, we love build threads! Looking forward to seeing the rest of this one! Keith |
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 13, 2019 10:26:06 GMT
Thanks Keith. The last forum I used to frequent regularly changed their system so that the forum server hosted the photos. A lot of us had used Photobucket, and when Photobucket did the dirty on its users by deciding they had to pay, all the photos on previous threads disappeared. I had kept a copy of all my photos and so was able to go through my previous threads and replace them, but some people had put their photos on PissPhotobucket without keeping a back-up copy. So you'll understand I'm a bit wary of image hosting services.
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ocarolan
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Post by ocarolan on Sept 13, 2019 10:44:35 GMT
... I don't trust the internet either! I never rely on it to be the only copy of photos, music etc! Weirdly, many of my Photobucket pics have reappeared where they were posted, albeit with a some text superimposed , though not all.  Keith |
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colins
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Post by colins on Sept 13, 2019 11:29:57 GMT
Thanks Keith. The last forum I used to frequent regularly changed their system so that the forum server hosted the photos. A lot of us had used Photobucket, and when Photobucket did the dirty on its users by deciding they had to pay, all the photos on previous threads disappeared. I had kept a copy of all my photos and so was able to go through my previous threads and replace them, but some people had put their photos on PissPhotobucket without keeping a back-up copy. So you'll understand I'm a bit wary of image hosting services.
David, yes mine were lost off of Luthier Community and here as well when photobucket did the dirty. I use Postimage.com now which seems to be pretty good. Colin |
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 13, 2019 15:06:27 GMT
Let's see if I can post a bit more.
The tail block is dowelled to the spacer and the carrier, and the carrier rotates on a dowel through its central hole and the base. The base is clamped to the drill table and the hole sanded by turning the tail block. Sanding increments adjusted in the high-tech fashion of hitting the base with a hammer.
By the way, this isn’t a ‘How to do it’ thread. This is ‘How I did it’ and, as you’ll discover, it’s sometimes ‘How I made a cock-up of it’, so if anyone has any suggestions for ‘How I should have done it’, please feel free!
This is another piece of birch ply being sanded (on a slightly simpler jig) to fit nicely into the hole in the tail block. I just realised that I haven’t mentioned that this guitar will have an adjustable neck which will be adjusted partly from outside and partly from inside the box. So there’ll be an access panel in the tail block, which is what the big hole is for.
Here, the mahogany side of the tail block is being sanded to the profile of the lower bout. The plywood disc is taped into position just to fill the hole because, without it, the sanding dust shoots out through the hole and straight into your face. It didn’t take me long to find that out.
Well, fingers crossed, Postimage seems to work. Thanks Colin.
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 14, 2019 9:00:52 GMT
So here’s what it looks like now.
To make sure that the tail block is a perfect fit when gluing to the sides, I stick some abrasive cloth to the mould with double sided tape and, with a couple of guides clamped in place, rub the block on the abrasive. A few pencil or chalk lines on the block show when I have contact all over. |
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 14, 2019 13:51:45 GMT
Threaded inserts being installed. I like this sort of thread insert but a certain amount of care has to be taken when installing them. The first thing is to do a test run on a piece of scrap wood to make sure the hole is the right diameter. It mustn’t be smaller than the root diameter of the thread or it will split the wood. I install the inserts at the same time as I drill the holes, because the wood is clamped in place and the hole is in line with the drill chuck. I take a piece of threaded rod and thread two nuts onto it and block the nuts using two spanners by tightening them against each other. Then thread the insert onto the rod. The rod is then placed in the drill chuck and, by bringing the chuck down and applying a little pressure, the chuck is turned by hand until the insert screws into the wood. I then unblock the two nuts (two spanners again) and the rod unscrews easily.
Machining the block for the neck tenon, etc.
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 18, 2019 13:42:56 GMT
Here's a little more 'wood engineering'.
Another piece of mahogany glued on to form a sort of Spanish foot. 
The foot is hollowed out. This won’t make it much lighter but reduces the area to be sanded to fit it to the concave surface of the back.
Milling holes for carbon fibre struts. |
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 18, 2019 13:49:41 GMT
The struts are let into the neck block at different compound angles because it’s going to be a wedge shaped body; deeper on the treble side than the bass. These are the little jigs used to form the compound angles.
One of the two retaining bolts will also be used to adjust the neck angle (through the heel from the outside) and the little maple block will house the barrel nut on the inside. The mahogany block is reinforcement. It sounds complicated (and it is a bit) but all should become clear
Here they are all shaped and glued together. |
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 18, 2019 13:53:12 GMT
I need to sand a curve into one side for the cutaway
So that’s the neck block finished.
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colins
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Post by colins on Sept 18, 2019 15:51:34 GMT
 Colin
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Post by lefranglais on Sept 21, 2019 16:47:56 GMT
Now, now Colin, you know we rough northern types don't know how to handle adulation! I was intending to use a set of EIR that I already had for the back and sides, but due to a couple of unforeseen serendipitous events I finished up with three very nice sets of Claro walnut, so I decided to use one of them. I started by drawing the side profiles using the colins method. www.luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10102&t=8117&hilit=+sideI not only had to use spacers of different thicknesses to allow for the difference in depth of the body at neck block and tail block, I also had to do the same from side to side because of the 20mm difference in the wedge (did I mention that one of the ‘bells & whistles’ is a ‘Manzer’ wedge body?). The resultant profiles look like this. I foresee problems with the solid linings (not to mention the bindings) It’s going to be a pointy cutaway so I started by making a simple bending former. Here it is in action. It’s in the cooling down stage here. I don’t muck about trying to take photos while it’s heating up. Bending the rest of the treble side. Nothing unusual here. |
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Post by Akquarius on Sept 21, 2019 17:51:51 GMT
I'm looking forward to see how this progresses. Excellent thread!  |
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Post by NikGnashers on Sept 22, 2019 6:18:58 GMT
Really interesting stuff, thank you.
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Jo whoever he is.
