Spalted/quilted mahogany and Engelmann 00 12-fret

[David L]

+1 for African Blackwood, I just absolutely love it, it may just be my most favorite wood. As Darryl said it is a true Rosewood. Supposedly it rivals or even surpasses the revered Brazillian Rosewood for tonal characteristics. I like it better than Ebony because Ebony is so homogeneous that it sometimes doesn't even look like wood. African Blackwood often times has some caramel colored marbling. It also has an inner chatoyance that Ebony lacks, it has a luster that makes it appear that you can see into the wood. It is also heavy, so heavy that it actually will not float on water, I know that this is true because I tested it, sank like a rock. A have a beautiful set of African Blackwood back & sides (that I spent a small fortune on) that I plan to use for guitar number 5 or 6, I want to get a little more experience so that I have less of a chance of screwing up this expensive set.

Did I mention that I just absolutely love African Blackwood?

David L

[Ken Hundley]

Thanks, guys.. the back and side sets for that guitar are Curly Mango, I got from a guy in Hawaii. I have another set I will use one of these days, love the stuff.

Another thought, if you want to go reddish wood, is Padauk. It is inexpensive, and incredibly easy to work with. Bends beautifully, smells like cinnamon when you work it.



This guitar is made from padauk with maple binding. You could use padauk for the binding. It will be a bright red for a while, but will eventually darken to a rich, coffee brown as it ages. LMII even sells fingerboards and bridge blanks out of it, so again, another balanced alternative that can be used on all parts of the guitar.

[Tim R]

Following up on the “shooting board” thread…

The Kenneth Michael design appears to work well. I used a piece of mdf that was cut on one of those vertical wall saws at the hardware super store for the sanding surface, and it seems to be flat enough in my case.

One pic below shows the soundboard halves with a small intentional gap. The other pic shows the halves pushed together, but not under pressure.

You may notice the outline of a guitar shape below the wood. I placed the light in the middle of one of John Hall’s always handy guitar molds with plate glass on top of it and the engelmann halves on top of that. Took me a while to figure out how to sand the edges flat. I'll post on that too in case there is interest.

-Tim

[Tim R]

Hello all,

I would like to make a wood rosette out of “scrap” wood from the mahogany back and sides set. The first pic shows a sketch of the rosette and the four pieces of scrap wood, two with a couple of coats of Tru-oil. The second pic shows the joined soundboard and one of the scrap pieces. The wood rosette will be flanked by BWB plastic on both sides, which are the inside and outside dark rings on the rosette sketch.

What I would like to do is cut the wood pieces and join several of them at angles to form a wood ring from which I can route the wood section of the rosette. I would like to use mostly the darker grained sections of that wood. The lighter, more golden colored sections are similar to the back and sides.

Can this be made to work and do you all have suggestions about how to approach it? My plan is to join and glue the wood pieces on top of wax paper. The grain direction won’t line up from section to section, but with only ¼” width and a complex grain pattern I’m hoping that it will look good anyway... Then I'll have to figure a way to keep the wood ring fixed while routing.

The wood is about .1” thick right now. I’m planning to leave it at that thickness and sand down to the level with the soundboard once the rosette is installed…

Comments and suggestions appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

[Darryl Young]

I would have to do a search but I've seen a rosette here made from small, radial sections of wood. I'm trying to recall who make it. Maybe it will come to me or they will chime in. It looked very good so I think your idea is workable. Not sure if you were considering running the grain radially but it looks nice.

[JVan]

Here is a rosette I done Tim, I used 6 separate pieces of Cocobolo and cut them to fit in the channel, when complete it looks like 12 individual pieces, I also used small pieces of Ebony in between the coco sections. I glued in the outer radial lines( B/W/B) first, inset the coco and ebony pieces and then routed in the channel for the inner lines. I think since you are going with 1/4" width you should have plenty of wood there and I believe it will look very good which ever way you choose. This is just one way of doing it.
( I had to re glue the sound hole cut out back to my work board to route in the inner lines, took some doing, I thought I was done with and then I changed my mind, I will never cut out the sound hole until I am absolutely sure next time that I am done!) but it worked~

Jeff

[Tim R]

Thanks for the comments Darren and Jeff. Jeff, that rosette looks awesome, but I'm not ready to try something that complex.

I guess there are at least three ways I could do this, all as a simple wood ring flanked by BWB:

1) radially

2) I could cut pieces in a way that keeps the grain direction constant at, say, a 45 degree angle to the grain of the soundboard. I think I've seen something like this before but it probably was routed from one larger piece of wood.

3) I could join pieces end to end at angles, so that the direction of the wood grain for each piece is roughly tangent to the circle.

I'm leaning toward #2 but not sure...

Tim

[Ken Hundley]

Thanks, guys. Tim, the back and side woods are Curly Mango, a wood I have absolutely fallen in love with. I have another set and am trying to figure out what I am going to make with it....not quite as highly figured as this set, but gorgeous nonetheless.

[Tim R]

All,

I've made progress with the rosette. I was so involved in trying to get it right that I didn't take many pics. The first one below shows the wood pieces glued together and the first route circle. The second one shows the finished rosette but I have not yet glued it in or sanded it flush.

It is a tad bit loose but you have to look closely to even notice. If I recall, the plastic rings well swell slightly with Duco cement. Is that the case and is it permanent? If so that might do the trick.

Thanks,
Tim

[johnnparchem]

The rosette looks great!It will swell with tightbond or LMI white, I am not so sure about duco as it is not water based.