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PostPosted: Sat Dec 15, 2012 7:16 am 
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While the varnish was going on, I was making a bridge clamp of the through bolt variety, seeing as I don't have enough cam clamps. I also made an mdf bridge locating jig.

Image
You simply line up the end with the nut and the sides of the fingerboard, and the other end rests against the front of the saddle.

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Scraping off the finish.

Image

Image
The bridge clamp in action. It seems to work ok.

Image
I added a cam clamp to increase the pressure.

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PostPosted: Sat Dec 15, 2012 7:17 am 
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And a few more photos:
Image

Image

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PostPosted: Sat Dec 15, 2012 9:10 am 
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Very cool, Peter. Quite a first effort.


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PostPosted: Mon Dec 17, 2012 1:05 pm 
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ALMOST FINISHED!!! bliss bliss

I finished filing the fret ends, installed the tuners properly and glued the fingerboard down.
Image

Image

Then filed the slots into the nut, roughly shaped the saddle and strung it up.
Image

Image

Nothing snapped off - not even the bridge! laughing6-hehe It sounds great already and it's only been strung a couple of hours. Really bassy at the moment, but I suppose that will settle down a bit. It's really loud too. The action is still too high and I haven't intonated the saddle yet, but it's finally a guitar.

Image

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PostPosted: Tue Dec 18, 2012 9:15 am 
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Peter this is really an impressive first build. I can't wait to hear it. I really dig your clever home made jigs and tools too. I'd also like to see a close up of that heal, I've never seen anything like that and it looks really cool.


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PostPosted: Tue Dec 18, 2012 10:36 am 
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Peter, very nice indeed. Isn't it great to get almost to the end!!

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PostPosted: Tue Dec 18, 2012 11:25 am 
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SteveSmith wrote:
Peter, very nice indeed. Isn't it great to get almost to the end!!

It certainly is!

jfmckenna wrote:
Peter this is really an impressive first build. I can't wait to hear it. I really dig your clever home made jigs and tools too. I'd also like to see a close up of that heal, I've never seen anything like that and it looks really cool.


Thank you. The heel was an attempt at copying this one by Michihiro Matsuda:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/matsudagui ... 391918722/
I really love his work. He also gave me the inspiration for the headstock design and the rosette is copied from Somogyi - nothing new really!

Image

The end cap is a really strange bit of wenge (I think) - it's white and brown instead of brown and black.

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PostPosted: Thu Dec 20, 2012 12:24 pm 
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Well it looks as though cutting yourself is catching! I've just got back from A+E after cutting halfway through my thumb with a handsaw. No more guitar playing for a few weeks. Fortunately I have recorded a couple of videos but they are really bad quality and don't represent the true sound of the guitar at all. I think they will have to do though as I'm going home for a two weeks and not bringing the guitar with me (300 miles by train and London underground in a gig bag... er no duh ). At least I have some nice photos.

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PostPosted: Thu Dec 20, 2012 12:45 pm 
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Oh, no Peter! I'm so sorry you injured yourself. Every time someone posts an injury, it reminds me to stay completely present during woodworking, and not even go into the shop if tired, distracted or if it just doesn't feel right. Best wishes for a rapid recovery!


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PostPosted: Thu Dec 20, 2012 4:35 pm 
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[xx(] A saw cut takes a lot longer to grow back than a knife. We're sure not doing a very good job of promoting the safety of hand tools over power tools :oops: But at least your thumb is still attached, unlike what would probably have happened on a bandsaw or table saw. Hope you recover quickly and don't have any lasting damage.

How about doing a one-handed video? Maybe just tune it to DADGAD or some other open tuning, and pluck and strum a bit to give us an idea of the natural sound of it, to help mentally translate the poor quality videos into what they should be :)


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PostPosted: Thu Dec 20, 2012 6:04 pm 
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DennisK wrote:
[xx(] A saw cut takes a lot longer to grow back than a knife. We're sure not doing a very good job of promoting the safety of hand tools over power tools :oops:


Well it wasn't guitar building related, blame boat building instead!
Unfortunately, the video quality is more to do with the camera than the playing. Its really annoying, because I'm getting a microphone for christmas, but I won't be back in time to make the deadline.

Beth Mayer wrote:
Oh, no Peter! I'm so sorry you injured yourself. Every time someone posts an injury, it reminds me to stay completely present during woodworking, and not even go into the shop if tired, distracted or if it just doesn't feel right. Best wishes for a rapid recovery!


Yes tiredness was the cause this time. Its dangerous because you don't really notice it until it's too late.

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 9:53 am 
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Ok, here are the final pictures.

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 9:54 am 
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Some more:
Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 10:00 am 
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And the video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0VTEweks28
Can anyone tell me how to embed it?

I'll try to upload a better quality one as soon as possible, but that will be after the deadline.
How many pictures are we allowed in the voting thread?

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 11:30 am 
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PeterF wrote:
...How many pictures are we allowed in the voting thread?


I think there is an 8 photo limit per post and we're supposed to keep it to a single post.

Awesome job for a first - congratulations [:Y:] [:Y:]

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 2:14 pm 
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Looks great!

To embed, I think you put the link in between these: [youtube] [/youtube]

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 2:45 pm 
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There we go. It's really picky about formatting of the URL. Had to change the https:// to http://

So from the editing window, it looks like [ youtube ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0VTEweks28[ /youtube ] without the spaces in the youtube tags.

Very nice work! First guitars don't get much more successful than that [clap]


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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2012 4:02 pm 
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[:Y:] [:Y:] [clap] [clap] [clap] [clap]

Extremely well done !!

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PostPosted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 9:38 am 
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Really well done, Peter! The song seemed to showcase the sound well. It sounds very mellow. Amazing first effort! Congratulations [:Y:]


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PostPosted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 12:57 pm 
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Thanks for the nice comments [:Y:]

I have been testing my new recording setup and it sounds great. Can't wait to try it on this guitar.

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PostPosted: Fri Dec 28, 2012 9:29 pm 
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Looks great! If you wind the treble strings the other way around the posts, you will get straight string pulls through the nut which will also look nicer. Great job and hard to believe it is your first.
How did you make the side dots for the fret board, or did you buy them?
I like 'em!

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PostPosted: Sat Dec 29, 2012 4:49 am 
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Thanks again. It's definitely the first, but I did spend about 6 months reading everything I could about guitar building before starting. That made it so much easier.

Tony_in_NYC wrote:
Looks great! If you wind the treble strings the other way around the posts, you will get straight string pulls through the nut which will also look nicer. Great job and hard to believe it is your first.
How did you make the side dots for the fret board, or did you buy them?
I like 'em!


Funny I didn't notice that - especially as I was aiming for straight runs :oops: . My current guitar is a steel string with a slotted headstock, so I'm not used to these sorts of tuners.
The fret markers were a bit of plastic tubing that I found in my odds and ends drawer, filled with rosewood dust and CA glue.

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 2:58 pm 
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New video with a proper microphone.


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 10:59 pm 
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That is amazing Peter! You did an incredible job, even if this were your 10th instrument. The voice and sustain are awesome. You should be very proud of that guitar [clap]


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PostPosted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 11:14 am 
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Thank you all again for the compliments. [:Y:]
I've been seriously playing the guitar for about 3 years as a hobby and the guitar that I had been learning on had certain features that I wished I could change, such as a 12 fret neck and a neck that almost needed a reset to get the action lower. I then found Steve Summerford's blog on building a guitar in your kitchen, and seeing as I had a room full of machinery at my disposal, I thought I would give it a go! It's very different to boatbuilding though - tolerances are about an order of magnitude smaller - so it was quite a learning experience.

Before committing myself to building, I spent about 4 months or so just trawling through websites of lutherie information and generally getting an overall picture of how they are built, what tools I would need etc. and through this I came across Somogyi and Matsuda's work which really inspired me to try doing things differently. Somogyi's bracing method just seemed to make sense, as it spreads out the load over a wider area, leaving the top to vibrate more evenly.

And the most important thing I learned from the challenge? Working to a deadline and that you don't need expensive materials to make a nice sounding guitar! (apart from tuners - mine rattle occasionally :roll: )

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