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That's really beautiful John!

Do you mind sharing what make of tuning machines you used? I don't recognize them.

Leo

Thanks!

They are Gilbert tuning machines. I bought this set a bunch of years ago when I had him build an 8 course set for me.

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http://www.Harvestmoonguitars.com

Guess this is more of what is happening to my shop than what's happening in my shop, but since I moved from Tennessee to the mountains of North Carolina, the size of my shop was cut in less than one half. We moved from a 3500 square foot house with a pretty good sized shop to a 950 square foot house with a very small shop space. Downsizing was a great thing, and even in the downsized shop, it became the most efficient shop space I've ever had. But it is cramped.

My wife's sewing room was way too small, so we decided to double its size. The bonus was underneath her sewing room is my shop! The addition adds about 1/3 to the size of my shop. Mainly gives me some elbow room along with space for a part time spray booth, a luxury I've never had before. Woo Hoo!

I think I'm finished with my fretting hammers.



Sent from my moto g(50) using Tapatalk

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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.

Finished my first lattice braced guitar, I used an all wood lattice without plywood or carbon fiber in the style of my mentor Stephen Hill who has become quite well known for this model of guitar over the last 25 year. Cedar top, Honduran rosewood back/sides/bridge/fretboard/head veneer (all flitch matched), book matched Spanish cedar neck with center laminations of Brazilian Rosewood and satinwood with a matte oil varnish inspired by the English luthier Kevin Aram. Took some shots at the local brewery because the lighting was great and the beer excellent too.

The image displays the message "Content not viewable in your region."
Are you using IMGUR?

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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.

Huh that's strange, I've always used Imgur in the past and can't recall this being a problem before

shows up fine for me.
Very nice Brian.

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Wake up and smell the rosewood!

Very nice guitar Brian.


The background is a little fuzzy, but do have nine beers on tap at your home?

Checked and apparently regulators plans to "fine Imgur after probing its approach to age checks and use of children's personal data"
Must be easier to just not give UK access....

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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.

Here ya go Colin, and anyone else who perhaps cannot see the images.

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Wake up and smell the rosewood!

There's actually 12 taps in that photo, 3 are smaller handles with different spouts (nitro beers). Not my house (would be nice though) but rather the local brewery tasting room. My friend takes their promotional photos so we killed two birds with one stone by photographing the guitar at the bar. Had some beers too.

Gregor, thanks for that, I can see I was missing out.
Brian, what a beautiful build. Lattice top, Cedar, Honduran RW everywhere, that must absolutely sing!

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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.

A guitar I made about 12 yrs ago. I applied the Royal Lac incorrectly and it crazed. I'm finally striping it to refinish. I'm not in a hurry so I'm just using a scraper - I prefer that to a sander till I get down to bare wood so I don't thin out the wood too much. This one will get a new top too, I don't like how the top is voiced and I think the rosette is ugly

Edit: I forgot to note that I discussed this with Vijay when this occurred and he said I would need to strip it mechanically so that means scraper or sanding. That's also why it sat in the shop so long.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I spent a day over in Maryland last weekend to cover for one of the gentlemen doing a back-haul on some airplane components (more later). In the few weeks since I was last there, the boys finished the upgrade on the sanders/drill press machine bank. I found the design of the drill press collector worth a few photos, as well as the 3D printing applications showcased.

The west wall dust system was originally just the one 6" to 4" drop to the spindle sander, but is now upgraded to 3 x 4" drops with addition of a second 6-6-4 wye and three blast gates (these are the POWERTEC 70326-P2 upgraded gates - excellent and good seal when closed). While the spindle and disk sander use the standard 4" flex hose to the back of the machines, the drill press collector uses a 44" class monitor/TV articulated arm that moves in the x, y, and z directions, as well as rotates about the y and z axes. In the shots, the collector is rotated for closer dust pickup while still remaining clear of the press as well as cross-hairs of the laser centering system. The collector pulls up and clear of the press and table with a shove, as the arm is counterbalanced in all directions for movement by internal, adjustable springs.











On the 3D side, the grey PETG components seen (brackets and adapters) were designed and printed for the job, and are self-sealing with a .0005" bump in the interior wall of the adapters. The brackets use heat-set 1/4-20 inserts for fastening to the repurposed phenolic router table insert, as well as for the winged toggle bolts which tension the brackets holding the clear dust collector body in place (while still allowing that tube to be moved up or down to adjust beyond the articulated arms limits. Speaking of the arm - total overkill... all cast aluminum and heavy sheet steel... $70. There are any number of budget arms made from sheet stock that would work just as well.



Referencing an earlier post in this thread, the current flock of table saw inserts for the cabinet saw are printed in PETG and assembled with an alignment key-way. The heat set inserts provide ready adjustment for flushing up zero-clearance plate to the top of the saw, and a coat of satin urethane makes things look pretty and protects any writing on the insert.

My trip over to Maryland was directly due to a couple of Recording King (new) and Stella (old) guitars being converted to rubber bridge function a la Mr. Reuben Cox’s Old Style Guitar Shop recipe. Add a tailpiece (the short trapeze style works best for Size 2 through 0 12 fretters), replace the bone saddle with rubber, do a bit of fitting with standard nut files, then install a relatively wide range humbucker (we use the Seymour Duncan Hot Rails neck pickup) and volume /tone control, then string up with stainless steel flatwounds in 11-49 or 12-52, depending on whether there will be a lot of use in lower tension tunings such as Open/Crossnote C or CSusD.



I mentioned my trip over to Maryland... here is a shot of why one of the boys could not show up to get the scut work done on those conversions... because he was at his other, other office. All photos my own or used with permission.

That's pretty cool Woodie! I've always just used a reticulating one from LeeValley for the drill press. Works fineish. I have a chopped up one gallon milk jug for when I'm using the safety planer and it catches "most" of the mess. I like the green guitar but likely won't be using that in my current repertoire.

OK update on the shop. The work is done, except on my part. Here's what it's looking like now. Added about 33% to the size, but it opened things up so nicely! Roller door in the back lets me set up a spray booth with explosion proof fan and lights with roll down walls (not seen in this pic). First proper spray booth I will have ever had! I can roll the door down to seal up with the blower. I don't spray often enough to warrant a permanent situation, but getting to the point where I can safely spray nitro is a big deal. Also being able to safely walk through the shop....

Dave

Pulled the top off of one of my old builds to retop it. This is the one that I scraped the old, crazed finish off of. I was never happy with the sound of this one hence the retop.

If you haven't cut a top off before it's not too hard. There are other ways to do this some are more elegant and some are less. This is just what I did today.

Something I learned a while ago (the hard way) when routing off old bindings is to route away most of the binding first but don't try to get it all or it has a tendency to splinter and rip out sometimes taking chunks of side wood. I just use a standard binding bearing/bit to do this. Then I switch to a 1/4" straight bit set to about 0.090" deep to start with and go freehand around the edge. After I get started I adjust the bit depth to get it just through the top.

Since I glue the UTB to the end of my neck blocks, I used an oscillating saw to cut the UTB away - easy plunge cut about 1/16" away from the neck block. Then I just cut the braces off. The strips of top I left on the neck block are there to keep the router from digging in too deep - easy to clean off those strips and the narrow slice of UTB with a chisel. It went pretty quick.

A little clean up then a few minutes driving the bus and it will be ready for the new top. Still enough of the old top left to align braces and such on the new top.

Told y’all that rosette was ugly, don’t know what I was thinking. Graphite buttresses was something I tried, several other luthiers were messing with similar ideas; I only did that on this one.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Finishing up the set up on my first guitar for Guitar Salon International. It's been a dream to work with GSI for well over a decade and to say I'm anxious to hear their review is an understatement!

Fresh off the bench- Mun Ebony & Carpathian Spruce with a Wenge neck and satin finish

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com

That's a purty one Chris!

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Beauty. My preferred way of doing the arm bevel as well.

One more...

















Hopefully I'll have another instrument done in another 1-2 years... Ha!

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com

Beyond thrilled to have had my first guitar shipped to GSI sell before the listing went public! I've been dreaming of seeing one of my guitars on their website since I was a teenager and to hear such complimentary words and the incredible impression my guitar made with them has been a dream come true!
https://www.guitarsalon.com/product/202 ... zkin-sp-in

Very nice guitar Brian,

You must be very pleased and honered.

Would love to hear a clip of it.

Cheers,
Bob