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Lately I've had a string of mistakes. One of my builds at the moment is a Les Paul copy. I somehow forgot how to count to 22 and cut the fingerboard too short, but was too dumb to realize it until after I inlaid, fretted, and bound it. That was stupid mistake #1.

Number #2 was yesterday. I recently sprayed my maple L-0 and while the lacquer is curing I have made plans to make a rosewood L-0. So I finally got to try out the heating blanket and slats I got from Bluescreek earlier in the fall. The bends turned out great, no cupping or cracks.... but when I put the sides into the mold I realized that I screwed up and somehow had the sides trimmed too short so I have a total of 2" gap at the center of the tail block.

I know everyone in this profession/hobby makes mistakes but man have I ever had some brain fades lately. Now I'm trying to figure out how if its possible to save these scraps I've made. The sides are fine at the waist and top bouts... I'm thinking that I if I shorten the lower bouts and make them a bit narrower I could build something a little more like a parlour size and maybe use my messed up fingerboard from mistake #1. Sorry for the long drawn out post, just kind of venting and thinking out loud.

Anyone else make stupid mistakes or am I the only one?

Yup, I also make mistakes, mostly seemingly dumb ones but really momentary lapses of attention. On my harp ukulele, an asymmetrical design, I bend my first set of sides as if was a left handed instrument. While cutting slots in a finger board, somehow I started with the first slot instead of the slot I make for the nut. It took me a bit to figure out how I ended up with a fret board of the wrong scale. Other mistakes are when I am using a power tool and I get to a point where I can not see well but I continue to where I think the line should be ... I could go on and on.

I have gotten better by making the different stages of the build a set of processes. At times I actually follow them . Getting better at hiding mistakes is probably where I have made the most progress.

My first kit, I've built a lot of it twice.

-tommy

P.S. - I'm still building it.

If you learn from the mistakes , they are learning experiences , Also they can be design enhancement possibilities

tippie53 wrote:If you learn from the mistakes , they are learning experiences , Also they can be design enhancement possibilities

I've had multiple "design enhancements."

Always an opportunity to make it "better" too.
And remember, "never point out your mistakes to the customer", but to your friends and wife it is okay. :>)

Kevin

Well I am not good enough to have customers yet but my wife is the one that asked if I could use the sides to build something else and it got me thinking. I've attached a pic of the sides in my mold. Joined together as shown the body would be around 19" long and the lower bout about 13.5" (give or take a bit). Or I could shorten the body length a bit and get a little more width. The width would be about halfway between the L-0 shape and a parlor. It might be an interesting guitar, I don't know. Comments?

I think you have something going on there. You could get a parlor mold from John and then reshape those as necessary to fit too.

Here's the pride and joy of all my mistakes.

some of my best ideas came from accidents that were not planned for.