Guitar #3 -- an OM cutaway

[MaineGeezer]

I still need to get the latches to hold the two halves together, but otherwise it's about set. I guess I'll have to fill in the little notch at the top on the cutaway side. That's there because I put an extension on the cutaway side form (see previous entry's photo) to support the side leading into the curve.

[MaineGeezer]

I just installed the toggle clamps on the body mold to hold the halves together. I'm ready to bend sides, whenever I can get time in Carter's shop.

After fretting and blithering for weeks about how I was going to do the fingerboard inlays and agonizing over whether or not I would be able to do an acceptable job, I have solved the problem. I'm going to pay somebody who knows what they are doing to install the inlays. Dave of Custom Pearl Inlay (one of the advertisers on this site's home page) quoted me a price to inlay a 000-42 style set of "snowflake" inlays in my fingerboard that made it ridiculous to contemplate doing it myself. Seeing the photos on his website of all the incredible stuff he's done, it's almost embarrassing to ask him to do "just" a 000-42 snowflake set. I'm glad he will do it.

[Diane Kauffmds]

The mold looks great Steve. The guitar will be stunning.

[MaineGeezer]

I finally arranged for some time in Carter's shop. We sanded the sides to final thickness (0.085"). I had sanded them down to 0.100" with my homemade thickness sander, but wasn't sure just how far to go. Carter said 0.085"...so that's what we did.

My bending forms fit his bending machine just like they were supposed to. We bent the bass (non-cutaway) side. Whenever I can arrange another visit I'll bend the cutaway side...which is Fraught. (I'm not sure what it's fraught with, but something!)

Carter's bending machine is homemade, and he never got around to making the second pressure arm to accommodate cutaways. Although he built cutaways in luthier school and during his apprenticeship, I guess he's never felt inclined to build one since he got out on his own. I'll make the arm while I'm waiting to get back in his shop. That likely won't happen for at least three weeks, so it will give me something to do while I wait.

We discussed the finer details of how to do the cutaway corner. I'll expand on that in another posting a bit later.

Update: I finished making the 2nd screw-down arm for Carter's bending machine to press the side into the cutaway. I hope it fits....

[MaineGeezer]

Here's a photo of the preparation to glue the halves of the neck together. I'm using hot hide glue, which is heating in the little crockpot in a water bath. There are a couple of registration pins in the neck so I don't have to worry about alignment and the pieces sliding around. And plenty of clamps handy!

[MaineGeezer]

Here's a photo of the neck with the truss rod channel cut and the carbon fiber rods glued in place. At one point I was convinced I had mixed the epoxy improperly (wrong proportions) and it was never going to set up, but it eventually did. I used West's Gel-Flex, which is fairly goopy and flows a bit more than some others. It seemed like a good choice for this application.


I'll also include a photo of a piece of scrap butternut with some finish on it. It looks quite nice

[MaineGeezer]

Here's a photo of the headstock, close to its final dimensions.

The lizard inlay (thank you, CNC!) came out well, but now that it's in I'm not sure I like its orientation. It looked great when I laid the inlay on the heastock trying out different directions! Oh well -- can't do anything about it now.

I am growing to hate working with butternut. It is weak and splintery and altogether a pain.

[Talladam]

The butternut looks really cool. Too bad it's a pain. It will be interesting to see how your rosette looks with the finished top, I've got the same one for my guitar. I opted out on the herringbone binding though. I think it might make your guitar a bit more cohesive.

[MaineGeezer]

I got the binding done on one side of the fingerboard. It's curly maple with the addition of a B/W stripe. I put a little stain on the curly maple to help bring out the figure. It came out acceptably well. I hope I can do as well on the other side.

I think I mentioned it before, but in case I haven't, I got Custom Pearl Inlay to install the fret markers for me. They were prompt and did a great job.

[MaineGeezer]

I profiled the neck to just slightly wider than the fingerboard and put a couple of locating pins through the fingerboard for when I glue it. I think I'm ready to glue it, but paranoia has set in and I'm wondering what else I should do before I glue on the fingerboard.

I had a heck of a time binding the end of the fingerboard. I wanted to do an ogee curve on the end to reflect the curve at the top of the headstock. The purfling lines, in addition the binding, made it complicated. How do I cut the ledge for the purfling strip? In the end, i filled in below the purfling strip and didn't cut a ledge. It was still difficult to bend the binding to the tight curve required. Next time I think I might just cut the end off square and forego the curve.