Finished construction on my Koa Parlor Guitar.

[johnnparchem]

I have been waiting for me new shop to be finished before I got going on this guitar, but the shop still has a couple of weeks. So I started this project in my garage.
You will see in the pictures that I was able to use my new handy LMI plat gluing jig to glue my top and back plates together.
I made a rosette from some spalted veneer I had from a mystery pack of rosette wood that I have. It was progressing nicely until I tried to fill in the purflex purflings with black epoxy, before I sealed the end grain of the redwood. It is still too early to show that picture. Lets just say I have some nice wood for a ukulele top that I can salvage.















I went ahead and bent the sides with my Blues Creek guitar bender. That all went well the sides were thinned to a bit over .09" before bending.







Feeling bad about the lost top, I went to my local Rocklier store and found a chunk of Amboyna Burl to use for the rosette and possibly a head stock veneer. I resawed a couple a pieces of veneer, sanded them level and then glued them together book matched. It looks like I can get a cool rosette from it.

[Darryl Young]

Looks great John! Book matching was a great way to make this large enough for a rosette.

[Kevin Sjostrand]

Oh that is purty wood. So sorry about the first rosette, but the second one is going to be even better my friend.
Can't wait to see your finished shop and do some drooling over those pictures.
That will be a nice combination, Koa and redwood.
I got to make me a bending machine!

Kevin

[David L]

How do you like that LMII joining jig, looks like a pretty spiffy rig. That amboyna is going to look awesome!

David L

[johnnparchem]

thanks for the encouragement,

I felt sort of dumb not sealing the channel. It was like the elementry school experiments with a stalk of celery in black dye. I kept sanding but the stain went the full depth of the channel.

On the positive side I am getting extra rosette practice on this project! Also I have a really nice redwood top for a good sized uke.

[Darryl Young]

John, what kind of purfling is that around the original rosette? Looks nice but I'm not sure I've seen that before.

[johnnparchem]

John, what kind of purfling is that around the original rosette? Looks nice but I'm not sure I've seen that before.

It is purflex (from the makers of zipflex)
http://petrosguitars.com/gallery/Petros ... rflex.html

It looks like they bind a strip of some sort of wood and laser cut the pattern. It is cool but expensive stuff. I bought a few strips at the GAL convention in tacoma this summer. The black epoxy is used to fill the cut areas in the pattern.

John

[johnnparchem]

I put together a cedar top at least that is what it smells like. I have three sets. It is perfectly quartersawn and it has the most glass\bell like tap tone I have heard. I think I bought this at GAL auction this summer. (I should keep notes!) It will be interesting to hear what it sounds like on a guitar.

[johnnparchem]

Rosette and top take 2:

After the last top disaster I set off to put a new rosette on the to my new top. As shown in the previous post I cut and book matched the rosette veneer out of an amboyna burl. I spent a little time laying out exactly what I wanted as opposed to winging it which is my normal style..



I went with we a slightly bigger sound hole 3 3/4 than the Antes plans I have show. I like the look at hope that it give my a bit of a deeper resonance than the 3.5" hole the plans had.



The next batch of picture show how I learned to make wood rosettes from Rick Davis (runningdog). Using the router I carefully route out the rosette only to the depth that matches the thickness of the rosette I want. (than a smudge more). Once routed I run it upside down through my drum sander until the rosette drops out. Doing it this way keep the rosette nicely centered in good wood while doing all of the routing.









With the rosette made, I carefully laid out and routed the rebate for the rosette and an inside and outside fiber purfling .020".


This time before I did anything with glue I shellaced the rebate to avoid stains.



The rosette fit so well I used thin CA to glue it down. After leveling the rosette, I applied a wash coat of shellac to protect the top until much later in the project.

[tippie53]

can't add a thing nice .