With some anxiety, I tackled the front lamination. I was so concerned about the way the back had split that I cut apart the book-matched front face veneer and planed the edges again before joining (ag...

Never mind. Let’s get on with the easy stuff. The neck! Attachment : IMG_8927.JPG Attachment : IMG_8928.JPG Attachment : IMG_8930.JPG

By now, I had made two new moulds for back and front with 4 layers of 3mm MDF: i.e. an arch of around 12mm rather than 15mm as previously. And with gentler curves. So, the back went into the vacuum p...

@tv101 I’m making this up as I go along. It just seemed like a simple way to persuade the joined veneers not to split along my dodgy glue line. As usual, I was wrong.

Turns out some of you have short attention spans and don’t like all this talk of veneers. So, just for you, here’s some video of a vacuum pump.

Attachment : IMG_8912.JPG Hmmm... let’s see... Attachment : IMG_8913.JPG Nope. Well, that’s a little disappointing!

@rocknroller912 The adventure with the cutaway side suggests that the next stage in trying to force sawn veneer into a compound curve, without splitting along the grain, is gong to be using water in s...

@tv101 We used a two-pack urea resin. I doubt we’d have had time to correct my foolish error otherwise. And yes, left it overnight in the bag.

Next day, the other side was a doddle by comparison. Attachment : IMG_8906.JPG Attachment : IMG_8907.JPG

I decided to try and simplify things by bending and gluing the sides, which only require bending the lamination in one plane - not two. We chose the side with the least curves too: Attachment : IM...

Before I continue with this enthralling build, I’ll just clarify that veneer softener is normally used to flatten veneer that is warping and curling. Once applied, the veneers are wrapped in paper tow...

OFFS! Turns out there’s something called Veneer Softener! Who knew! Everybody but me, apparently.

I’m still accumulating little bits of advice from across the internet. Here’s one from Airpress: “When a knife cut veneer (0.6mm) gets wet with glue - it expands. When it expands it buckles and wrinkl...

Yup! A volume knob! I can’t resist it — is full sook 11?

@tv101 I reckon the critical factor will be how airtight the bag is. If it doesn’t lose much air in 5 mins then (slowly increasing) pressure is maintained. And the technique would only work if we use...

We’re trying to design assembly techniques that emulate methods Gibson pioneered in the 40s, but without building a factory full of heavy engineering. Here’s the best tour video I’ve seen on the Memph...

@robin I used Titebond for speed because we were only running tests, but I reckon the combination of Titebond AND spray AND thin (and a little warped) sacrificial veneers all contributed.

Conclusion? I can’t afford the time or the wood to do a full set of controlled experiments. There are too many variables: Mould depth The curve of the carve Thickness of veneers Number of layers Vari...

And so I returned with a new mould made with 6 layers of 2mm MDF rather than 5 layers of 3mm MDF - so approx 12mm deep rather than 15mm. We were running out of fancy veneer we could risk on tests. So...

Both pressings were aborted. I now had two slightly bent veneers with cracks. To continue the testing, we took the two cracked veneers and put a leaf of cross-grain poplar in between. Then we glued th...