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I normally use a fox style machine to bend my sides and then do touch-ups on a hot pipe, but I think I want to try bending completely on the pipe. I'm doing a tenor uke project right now with medium-figured koa with the sides at about 1.85mm thick. I'd also like to bend a cutaway into the lower bout. I normally wouldn't want to try figured wood or a cutaway for my first pipe bend, but the sides are smaller than guitar sides. Would anyone advise against doing this? I'm going to build a bender just for uke sides soon, so my other option is to go ahead and do that project before I get any further into the instrument build.

Cutaway in the Lower bout?? Must be for playing REALLY high notes
I've bent figured koa on a pipe with no problems. My sides are more like 1.75-1.8mm thick. Its one of the easier bending woods I think. Medium figure shouldn't give you any troubles.
Maybe thin the cutaway area down to 1.5mm if its a really tight radius.
Once you convert to pipe bending you might not go back

I have found from building a few mandolins that the thickness isn't as important as how you back up the bend while you you're bending. I only had problems with extremely figured maple and I got through that by having a few extra pieces on hand. It takes practice.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

I gotta be able to reach those notes a guitar can only dream of And I was thinking of scraping the sides down where the cutaway will be if I decide I want to do it. Always good to see numbers from other folks!

What do you do for backing? I know there are metals slats you can use, but I don't wanna spend the money, honestly. Could I use a scrap wooden block maybe? In the meantime I'll watch some youtube vids and see how folks manage

get a pile of scrap to practice on.

Madinter in Spain do orphan sides of mahogany for pennies as bending practice wood.

the fact thatr some finds its way into real builds is irelivent!!

I've had pupils at 15 years old bending mahogany to make the curvwed tops of mantle clocks after one practice run.

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They're easy enough to make out of any sheet metal you have around. Like a coffee can or roof flashing which is what I made mine from. It's a must have for small bends.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!