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I appreciate that some of you are anxiously following my progress. I often work feeling that I am toiling away in obscurity, battling irrelevancy.

So, here goes. A little more.

I had some veneers glued up, stacked dark/light, for a past guitar project . I figured that these would be perfect fo the purfling forthe viol fingerboard and tailpiece.

The log is cut at an angle and the pieces glued end to end, the slices are ripped off the long face. The slices are then glued together into a chevron pattern.

The photos show the stock for the fingerboard, tailpiece, a bridge "dummy" for doing alignment of the geometry of all of these pieces. The chevron purfling pattern has a light border added and it will sit between the dark Santos Rosewood of the fingerboard and tailpiece and look like this. At the moment it is simply being held between pieces for the photo.

I also cut up an extra dummy fingerboard out of cedar to carve to shape and use to get the correct alignment. I am suspicious that the surface of the neck is not at the correct angel for the string heights/bridge height. I want to work this all out before working the "real" pieces.

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

really nice work Douglas... I really like your purfling

Sweet! I love the sound of the Viol. I want to hear it!

Elegant work, Douglas!

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Hey, Douglas, this is a really interesting instrument. I've been following your progress. I love that photo with the viol propped up and all the patterns behind it. I had forgotten that you build canoes, too. I had a momentary lapse, trying to figure out how those patterns worked on stringed instruments. The joke is on me!
Patrick

Thanks for the kind words, everyone!

Michael, yes, I love the sound of the bass viol too. In fact, I am finding that I often prefer it over the cello. Not only the sound of the instrument itself, but the accumulation of changes that six strings and the Baroque bow adds to the playing. The Bach Cello suites played by Paolo Pandolfo is an excellent example.

Patrick, I take this scene for granted so many times that it seems obvious to me and I forget how it must look to others.

On a side note, I have recently learned that traditionally viols would have the hard rosewood or ebony laminated over a lighter weight wood, sometimes spruce. Apparently solid pieces of dense wood making a very heavy fingerboard can really hamper the instrument. Its not too late and I'll need to make that decision soon.

In the meantime, I cut a piece of cedar on which to work out the shape of the fingerboard and the neck/bridge geometry.

And I need to decide on the purchase of a bridge... the odds of me finding a nice piece of maple from which to split out a billet to make a bridge is pretty low.

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