Post by davewhite on Jan 1, 2017 15:24:02 GMT
Some of you may be familiar with my “re-building” old creations some of which I’ve documented on the Forum. This one is a little bit special as it takes me right back to the beginning.
My first two creations started in 2002 - "Nancy" and "William" were conceived as a matching pair of small bodied guitar and guitar-bouzouki and their naming comes from the frequency of appearances of these names in traditional English songs and their design was dictated by the size of some wonderful pieces of Old Rio Rosewood I found in Isaac Lord in High Wycombe plus two spruce guitar top sets. The backs were six joined pieces and the necks had 16 frets clear of the body so you could say they were unique but there were influences there from the great maker Stefan Sobell who I very much admire. I finished them both in 2003 after an “interesting” journey and although in looks they were “rough as a badger’s arse” they sounded really good – the beginnings of the De Faoite sound:
Over the years the necks have been raided for the hardware – tuners, fingerboards and carbon fibre – and all that’s left are the boxes, here’s “Nancy”.
I’m going to re-use the Old Rio Rosewood back and sides with new Lawson’s Cypress tops and necks - from the “Musical Tree” that grew in my front garden. They will be based on my “An Feá Caol” Terz/parlour guitar body shape with a 630mm scale length and 13 frets clear of the body and they will keep their names and Serial Numbers, hence they will be “Trigger’s Brooms”. This will be the last of my “Anniversary Instruments” projects that I started in 2014 to mark the tenth anniversary of De Faoite Stringed Instruments.
The first task is to “liberate” the back and sides from the boxes and for this delicate task I’m using a specialist luthier tool equivalent to a surgeon’s scalpel – those of you with a nervous disposition look away now:
The back is released:
Another cut and the sides are free:
The process is repeated with “William”. The old linings, neck and tail-blocks are now carefully removed from the sides and the sides cleaned up. I’m going to start with “William” as it will be the most complicated One its sides had some bad damage at the top of the upper bout bend and so I decided to make the new guitar with a Florentine cutaway. I had a piece of the original wood that I could use for the cutaway side part. The sides are re-bent in the Fox-style bender using a heating blanket:
Here are the bent sides are in the mould:
The Sapele neck block is drilled for the bolt holes:
Next the holes for the 6mm carbon fibre flying buttress rods are drilled:
The slot for the fingerboard extension support is cut and the fingerboard support is then fitted and glued in using hot hide glue:
Two Bird’s Eye Maple binding strips are glued on to the neck block. The new cutaway side section was bent on the hot-pipe and is then glued onto the neck block together with a b/w/b purfing strip using hot hide glue:
The Sapele cutaway support block is shaped to match the sides and two Bird’s Eye Maple binding strips glued on:
The cutaway side piece is then glued onto the support block together with a b/w/b purfling strip using hot hide glue:
The treble side is then glued on to the cutaway support block with fish glue:
The Bird’s Eye Maple end graft is glued to the lime tailblock using hot hide glue:
The sides are glued onto the tail block with a b/w/b purfling strip in between the side and the end graft using hot hide glue:
An extra piece of Brazilian Rosewood is then glued onto the head block to meet up with the treble cutaway side:
My first two creations started in 2002 - "Nancy" and "William" were conceived as a matching pair of small bodied guitar and guitar-bouzouki and their naming comes from the frequency of appearances of these names in traditional English songs and their design was dictated by the size of some wonderful pieces of Old Rio Rosewood I found in Isaac Lord in High Wycombe plus two spruce guitar top sets. The backs were six joined pieces and the necks had 16 frets clear of the body so you could say they were unique but there were influences there from the great maker Stefan Sobell who I very much admire. I finished them both in 2003 after an “interesting” journey and although in looks they were “rough as a badger’s arse” they sounded really good – the beginnings of the De Faoite sound:
Over the years the necks have been raided for the hardware – tuners, fingerboards and carbon fibre – and all that’s left are the boxes, here’s “Nancy”.
I’m going to re-use the Old Rio Rosewood back and sides with new Lawson’s Cypress tops and necks - from the “Musical Tree” that grew in my front garden. They will be based on my “An Feá Caol” Terz/parlour guitar body shape with a 630mm scale length and 13 frets clear of the body and they will keep their names and Serial Numbers, hence they will be “Trigger’s Brooms”. This will be the last of my “Anniversary Instruments” projects that I started in 2014 to mark the tenth anniversary of De Faoite Stringed Instruments.
The first task is to “liberate” the back and sides from the boxes and for this delicate task I’m using a specialist luthier tool equivalent to a surgeon’s scalpel – those of you with a nervous disposition look away now:
The back is released:
Another cut and the sides are free:
The process is repeated with “William”. The old linings, neck and tail-blocks are now carefully removed from the sides and the sides cleaned up. I’m going to start with “William” as it will be the most complicated One its sides had some bad damage at the top of the upper bout bend and so I decided to make the new guitar with a Florentine cutaway. I had a piece of the original wood that I could use for the cutaway side part. The sides are re-bent in the Fox-style bender using a heating blanket:
Here are the bent sides are in the mould:
The Sapele neck block is drilled for the bolt holes:
Next the holes for the 6mm carbon fibre flying buttress rods are drilled:
The slot for the fingerboard extension support is cut and the fingerboard support is then fitted and glued in using hot hide glue:
Two Bird’s Eye Maple binding strips are glued on to the neck block. The new cutaway side section was bent on the hot-pipe and is then glued onto the neck block together with a b/w/b purfing strip using hot hide glue:
The Sapele cutaway support block is shaped to match the sides and two Bird’s Eye Maple binding strips glued on:
The cutaway side piece is then glued onto the support block together with a b/w/b purfling strip using hot hide glue:
The treble side is then glued on to the cutaway support block with fish glue:
The Bird’s Eye Maple end graft is glued to the lime tailblock using hot hide glue:
The sides are glued onto the tail block with a b/w/b purfling strip in between the side and the end graft using hot hide glue:
An extra piece of Brazilian Rosewood is then glued onto the head block to meet up with the treble cutaway side:
Jo whoever he is.
