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I'm confused. I have used 1/4 sawn for neck blanks and stacked heels, but this time my neck is flatsawn birdseye maple. What grain direction should the heel stacks be? This will be a Spanish style heel with slots for the sides. Can I use flatsawn pieces of the same birdseye stock as the neck for building up the heel?
Thanks, Wendy

I suspect it will look funny if you switch the grain orientation between the neck and heel stack? I'd stick with the flatsawn orientation.

Maple neck with a Spanish heel? Sounds like an interesting project.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

I would stack all of the pieces in the same grain order. It blends together nicely, visually, and all of the wood movement will be consistent.

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Expectation is the source of all misery; comparison the thief of joy.
http://redrivercanoe.ca/

Thanks Doug and Jim, that's what I wanted to hear.

So, then you already knew the answer! You're smarter than you think.

_________________
Expectation is the source of all misery; comparison the thief of joy.
http://redrivercanoe.ca/

So do you think there is a problem using flatsawn for a spanish heel? I have my heart set on birdseye maple and all I can find is flatsawn or riftsawn that I already have, but have decided not to use.

That's Ok, I'll take them off your hands.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I have never done a Spanish heel, so someone may come by and tell you why this won't work. . . I would consider laminating the neck blank with a center strip and have the flatsawn edge on the sides of the neck. You then would have no heel stack at all and the birdseye figure would show most on the sides of the neck and heel. Just thinking out loud. . .

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Mechanically, I don't think there is a problem with the spanish heel and flatsawn orientation. I've never used birdseye - I'd have to defer to Bryan on which orientation is the right one visually - no clue here.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Visually there isn't a right or wrong. Hard going carving a Neck/heel out of birds eye, you have my sympathy.

Birds eyes mostly show on the flat sawn side, so that orientation would be best visually. Flat sawn should pose no problem with stability because hard maple is plenty strong for nylon strings. Carving a neck from birds eye maple is not much harder than anything else. I did about a half dozen from it and the only thing to be cautious about is using a handplane because it can chip out the eye if your not careful.

You've obviously never done Cedrela then. There's a world of difference! Cedrela carves itself.