Nov 3rd 2013

Little by little I am making progress, on this guitar. To get in practice for my retirement I been taking a bunch of saved up vacation time and have been traveling. I am about ready to close the box on this guitar. I am throwing caution to the wind on this instrument. Although this is a 00 with the arm bevel the top is closer to the size of an 0 guitar so I braced it more like an 0 with a single tone bar. Also following the Gore\Gilet Contemporary Guitar design I am trying an active back. Once the guitar is together I may need to tune the back so that it is not in conflict with the top. The back is Hawaiian Koa. With its thickness and the bracing it is a very lively back with a good tap tone and feel. I also routed in an oval sound port. Basically the works: Arm bevel, Sound Port, cutaway, active back ... We shall see how it turns out. This one is for me so I can play with no stress.

From my 2nd guitar I had a bunch of BRW strips perfect for the side supports.

My first really tight joint at the correct angle!

Nov 1st 2013

Before I glue on the top I make sure that the rims are correctly profiled so that when the top is glued to the rims I have the correct angle for the fret board extension. I like to be able to roll a 2.5 mm drill bit under the straight edge and have it stop at the saddle location. Like in the picture.

I used fish glue for the first time to glue down the top, although once I smelled it I am sure I used it in elementary school. I followed the clamping with a slightly damp cloth as it is water soluble.

The following picture illustrates what is different about Kent Everett's bevel procedure than others that I had looked at before starting. The purfling and the binding edge for the top and rims are set before the guitar is assembled. My fear of the bevel was how to get a clean edge on the purflings\top or the purfling\rim hand cutting on the finished body. Setting this up before assembly allowed me to use all sorts of tools to get a clean edge.

Once I start binding I will glue the top purfling in the bevel backed by the top cutout from cutting the top. On the binding side I will thin the binding height where I need to follow the bevel.

Once the guitar is bound, I can comeback, with rasps and or sanding to shape the bevel. Then I will have a smooth surface to glue a piece of veneer. The veneer can be loosely cut as I can trim and sand back the over hang and it should blend in to the thinned binding on the rim and can blend into the top purfling.

Although I am not using a purfling on the rims, this method would have allowed me to do that as I am bending the binding into the bevel.

To make life a little easier I am using ebony bindings and ebony veneer.

We shall see.