www.KitGuitarsForum.com

Hello everyone..
I've been away from the forum for about 10 months now and I'm glad to be back on, spent the last three weeks reading a lot and catching up with all the post and projects of all you great forum members. I have relocated to another state ( Alaska) from northern Indiana back in February earlier this year. Not to get into why someone would just pack up and move from a somewhat normal mid-western town with a lot going in and around the area to a somewhat quieter, peaceful and colder place, but I did it!
Any who, I have, over the months, sent for some of my guitar building supplies, tools, ect,.a little at a time so I can get set up here in Alaska. I made one trip back to Indiana since and came back with a suitcase full of tools, wood and anything I could stuff in a checked bag for $25!, great deal considering the cost to ship anything up here! Some places will not even ship to Alaska??!!! ( That's for another thread). I have since found a place, (shop) to do my guitar work in, a basement shop in an old downtown Fairbanks building. So for my first major project that I will be diving into up here, is a guitar that's been my Achilles heel for the last 4 years now.
In 2011 I built as my 10th guitar a Brazilian rosewood Dred with englemann top, came out looking beautiful!, ( sorry no pics), sounded pretty good, but the guitar was heavy and the top eventually developed a crack. Since the guitar wasn't the best sounding and still quite new, instead of fixing the crack I chose to replace the top instead with a nice sitka top. After completing the the so-called rebuild, ( still no pics) I was still amazed that it was so heavy and the sound was not even close to better than it was! So, I took it completely apart in 2013 and put it on the shelf. It now has since found its way in a suitcase to Alaska with me!, so third time is a charm, right?, lets hope so...
I will be posting pics of my progress and we'll see how it turns out this time, if not I have a great place on the wall in the new house to hang it and put plants in it or something...
Since I took the guitar apart the back plate has lost some of its width, so I'm incorporating a wedge of Cocobolo and going with a D-35 look!
So I do have a couple of questions, How thick, or thin in this case, should the back and sides be with some very stable Braz? I'm currently at .12 ,and yes I got it hand bent without cracking!
and secondly, I have a really nice set of sitka for the top, a set of torrified sitka, and a set of torrified red( adi) spruce to use for it. Any thoughts? I'm looking for to maybe go with the old forward X pattern on the top as well, thoughts on this as well?.
That's it for now, Glad to be back on!
Thanks
JV

The neck survived the trip back to Alaska but the fret board didn't. I'm going to reglue and pin the fretboard back together, no loss there but I am thinking of stripping of the tinted lacquer and going with the natural mahogany so the black lines around the maple will show!

Hi,

Great to have you back!

I'm going to take a stab at the thickness issue and say that you could go as thin as ~ .100-.110" for the back and .085-.090" for the sides; I would use taller back bracing to ensure rigidity and stability. That should reduce the mass by quite a bit. For the top material, I've not worked with BW, but personally I'd lean toward the Adi.

As far as someone picking up and moving, I've done it, not as far as you have though. We lived in Cincinnati, Ohio and visited a friend in West Virginia for a day. We came to visit a friend and left owning a house, which was completely unplanned. It's a slower paced life, quiet, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Thanks Diane it is good to be back!
The move has been chaotic at times, not only the move from Indiana but I have moved once since I've been up here as well, from Fairbanks to the North Pole, ( not a joke, I live by Santa!!) ..but all is good now and settling in for a long winter and it is a perfect time to build!! I found that that the humidity up here is very low at times, so that presents a challenge. I have the shop in the 35-40% range now.
as far as the build goes I appreciate your thoughts, seems like the .090 thickness on the sides is where I will go and I am very much leaning towards the adi top as well.

Stay Thirsty My Friends..
JV

Yes it looks like that project is well worth repeating again.
I would leave the sides alone, thick sides are ok. You can go thinner on the back I go as low as .1 or a bit less.

I will be posting pics at the beginning of the year in the " blog your project" section of the forum.
Stay tuned!
JV