Pay attention to Mr Bailey and don’t show off to friends
Some people call me a tool, others are less complimentary. Tools being useful things.
the Duck Room (@TV101 will explain).
(clears throat)
Part1: Introduction
The "Duck Room" is a place of internet legend.
Long thought, by those who had heard only tales passed down through the Bliss generations, to be an imaginary place, or a place whose actual location had long since been lost from the collective human memory, there are some - known as the elder wisemen - who still insist that they had actually, with their own (as opposed to?) eyes seen The Duck Room.
Those elder wisemen insist that The Duck Room is the location where creation began.
No, not that creation.
In centuries past, The Duck Room was site of the creation of popular (stretching the definition a little) cultural artefacts, enjoyed by many (stretching the definition well beyond credibility) of the cognoscenti of musical (now stretched well beyond breaking point) artistry.
The real-life existence and location of The Duck Room was recently revealed to a very select, invitation only, inner circle group, sworn to secrecy (on pain of having to listen to the entire catalogue of musical artistry therein created) who are now tasked with preserving the legend and protecting The Ducks.
The revelation included an introduction to, not only the current curators of The Duck Room, but the person believed to be the original creator.
to be continued ...
Online guitar making courses – guitarmaking.co.uk
Another takeaway from this project is that two pack urea-formaldehyde resin is nothing like Titebond or other PVA based glues.
It sets overnight but it cures over days, maybe weeks. And once done, the lamination rings like a bell. 🤞
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
Sure enough, the next morning revealed that the face veneer (1.5mm thick) had opened up along the glue line.
I had another thought this morning, are the joints in the layers all on the centre line, might it help if the sandwiched layer joints were staggered?
might it help if the sandwiched layer joints were staggered?
I’m using three layers of knife-cut veneer and one sawn veneer for the face, all made by joining two pieces. Of the three knife-cut veneers, the second layer is perpendicular to the rest. On another build, I’d be tempted to try the two internal layers at 30°-45° and 315°-330°. But I haven’t really thought through the implications of that.
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
On another build, I’d be tempted to try the two internal layers at 30°-45° and 315°-330°. But I haven’t really thought through the implications of that.
I've seen ply laminated dinghy hulls built like that with alternate diagonal strips, I think they called it cold molding. It might well help to take the stress out of the face veneer joint.
Finally getting down to the actual building of this guitar!
Unlike solid sides, these laminations have rough, uneven edges and are not yet cut to size. So one edge was sanded flat on a sanding board, and then the other edge removed on the bandsaw.
Then the two sides were joined up using the heel block and kerfing glued on for front and back.
Closely followed by a neck block.
After a final sanding on the sanding board to make sure everything was level, the front was glued on using the mould as a jig to apply even pressure all the way round.
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
It was at the point where we decided to use the mould as a jig, that I realised I’d made the most profound, blindingly obvious mistake right at the very beginning of this build. And no-one seems to have noticed. Can you see what it is yet?
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
Can you see what it is yet?
Once the back and front is on, is the cutaway going to trap the mould in place?
I've been making the moulds for my acoustic and was wondering if that would be the case.
🗝️ "Life's what you make it"🗝️
@jamesbisset The mould is mirrored?
This wouldn't be important if I was making a double cutaway or no cutaway - it’s only significant if the guitar is not symmetrical across the centreline.
But if I’m making a concave mould, then the mould has to be the shape of the inside of the guitar, not the outside. The cutaway on the concave mould of a right-handed single cutaway should be on the left.
Courtesy of a quick photo flip, it should look like this:
As it is, I now have a couple of humps that aren’t quite in the right place. But as I’ve said already, it’s a prototype.
Onwards and upwards!
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
I always thought you had the hump about something just couldn’t work it out, so I’m clear on what it is now thanks
Some people call me a tool, others are less complimentary. Tools being useful things.
veneer softener
You mean this stuff: Diethylene glycol monoethethyl ether. I bought a coupl of 2.5l bottles of it from a lab supplies company 15 years ago and I;ve still got some. The one I have is made by Merck but I am sure that other brands of Diethylene glycol monoethethyl ether are available.
I have used it in the past, mainly on burr walnut, with a fair degree of success but I am not sure how effective it would be on thicker veneer.
That’s what the Bagpress needs - a volume knob!
All of my larger presses (4m3 per hour and upwards) have a built-in vacuum adjustment knob so the pressure can be slowly increased. This is a technique that only applies when using a slow cure UF resin as PVA will grab at a low pressure and prevent the layers of veneer slipping against one another and so prevcent them form properly forming the shape.
Can't believe nobody hash tagged me in this one.
@jamesbisset The cutaway is not quite cut yet. Major but Minor adjustment it seems like and it is your only recourse with a slight adjusting of the humps.
Apologies for the brief hiatus as I try to finish the album of tunes I performed for Acoustic Bliss last year. I’ve given myself until the end of the month.
But meanwhile, here’s an interesting snippet of information. I chose to use three knife-cut veneers faced with one sawn veneer for my laminations, as suggested in the Making a Laminated HollowBody Electric Guitar book. Gibson uses three sawn veneers, which I also tried when testing out the laminating techniques.
I’ve just weighed the two faces and the three sawn veneer lamination is approximately 18% heavier. The three veneers lamination is 4.8mm thick and the four veneers lamination is 3.7mm thick.
Enough procrastination. Back to the mixing desk!
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
Well, it’s been a while but the album is out, the website has been updated and I’ve entered the Scottish Album of the Year Award. This is a Cunning Plan because 100 people are ‘invited to consider’ all submissions and vote for a long-list. This means 99 more people than usual listening to my songs. Result!
But then I did the maths. If they listen to all 393 submitted albums in the allocated time-frame (max. 50 days) that’s around 8 albums a day for a month and a half. That would be cruel. It would probably trigger a sub-clause in the European Convention on Human Rights.
So, no surprise to find that my streaming stats haven’t shifted. Still getting one listen a week. As always, it’s not what you know - it’s who you know.
Back to Guitar Making - I know some really important people there - and they’re you!
Too much?
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.
The next step was to start cutting holes in the top. Two pickup routs, two ƒ holes and, critically, a neck pocket.
From the start, I assumed three possible methods for attaching the neck to the body:
- simple heel and neck pocket (glued)
- tenon
- dovetail
The dovetail (and probably the tenon) join would have required an extension of some sort to support the free-floating fingerboard for the last few frets - a technique you’ll see in many arch tops. There are also some theories about the number of faces you want to glue when doing neck to body, and for that both dovetail and tenon are optimum.
But this is my first full build, not a work of art, so the simple heel and neck pocket system (used on e.g. the Bailey Bandsman) was the obvious candidate. And then I’d be able to use my Neck Angle Jig!
The Bagpress Neck Pocket Routing Jig was used to copy the neck and cut a template for routing the body.
Several passes with different sizes of top bearing router bits gave us a usable pocket.
Jack of all trades and master of my own destiny. It’s only a small destiny.