Members Freeman Keller Posted September 14, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 14, 2014 Spent the day in the shop sanding and futzing with the neck angle. No pictures... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members gp2112 Posted September 14, 2014 Members Share Posted September 14, 2014 I get a bit hard whenever I read this thread and other build threads. Fabulous work! I think I would pay to be a helper on a project like this just so I could learn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 14, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 14, 2014 I get a bit hard whenever I read this thread and other build threads. Fabulous work! I think I would pay to be a helper on a project like this just so I could learn. That is the time honored way to learn the craft of lutherie - apprentice yourself to a master builder. I never had that option so I just blunder along and learn from my mistakes. (That is also why I don't call myself a "luthier" - I still make too many mistakes). There are also some very good guitar building classes, but of course you have to be close enough to make that work too. Lastly you can start the same way I did by building a kit - most have the really difficult operations (bending the sides, shaping the neck, mitering the fretboard) done for you - they aren't assembly projects like some of the electric kits but you still get to learn the steps of the project. When we get done with this one I have another ready to start - it will be more of a traditional solid body electric so it will relate better to this forum. If people are interested I'll do a build thread on that too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members papaschtroumpf Posted September 14, 2014 Members Share Posted September 14, 2014 It keeps amazing me how much work goes in the details, like that bound cap on the heal of the neck. Looks great! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DeepEnd Posted September 14, 2014 Members Share Posted September 14, 2014 I actually like the skulls on the truss rod cover and pickguard. They fit in with the rest of the design. Can't wait to see the finished version. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 15, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 15, 2014 I actually did take some pictures yesterday when I was doing all that sanding - last night I had a bad case of Sanders Elbow and it required several applications of liquid medication - I really didn't feel like posting anything.... So the story is that tropical hardwoods (rosewood, koa, mahogany) have "open pores" which means little divots in the surface of the wood. Of course pores are what gives a guitar fat tone, the more pores, the fatter the tone. Or is it the otherway around - I can never get it straight. Maybe I see another thread here.... Anyway, along with fat tone, pores give the finisher a headache. It takes many coats of finish to fill them and make them level with the surface, if you don't get them level you end up with a whole bunch of little lines about an 1/8 of an inch long all over the guitar. Couple of ways to deal with this - one is lots of coat and lots of sanding, but better is to fill them with something and level it with the surface. Traditionally paste fillers (kind of like wood putty) have been used - that's the way Martin does it and you can add some stain if you want to slightly color the wood. Paste is easy, spread it on across the grain and squeegee most of it off, then sand back just to the wood. Paste tends to dull things a little and this wood has some subtle but nice figure, I wanted to bring that out. Two more pore fillers are CA glue and epoxy - I've experimented with both and really like epoxy, namely a slow setting product call Zpoxy. It fills the pores and highlights the figure of the wood (in finishing parlance, it "pops" the grain). So, first sand the box with grits up to 220, looks like this Apply the Zpoxy thinned with a little denatured alcohol and scrape it with a piece of plastic (one of my wife's credit cards works very well and has another advantage - "honey, have you seen my Visa?"). Looks like this Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 15, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 15, 2014 Now its time to get off the pot. Every time I pick this thing up I slide the neck into the pocket, check some angles, futz around with it, then go on to the next thing I was going to do anyway. Lets glue this sucker in there and get it over with. (by the way, on most steel string acoustics we would wait and finish the body and neck separately. Classical and set neck electrics get the neck on now. I want to do it now so I can refine the curve of the cutaway to flow into the neck) Stop and think of everything that is going on with the neck joint - it is an exercise in four dimensional geometry. First, the center of the neck must be on the center line of the guitar. Extend the sides of the neck to the bridge position - they must be equal distance from the center line also. The plane formed by the frets must be the correct height at the bridge. The neck must be the correct depth in the pocket of the dovetail joint. Both sides of the heel as well as the cap on the bottom must be flush with the body. All of this is held together by a bunch of angled pieces of wood. No wonder William Cumpiano call the dovetail neck joint "the joint from hell". That's what we've got here. A few picture, here is checking the angle at the bridge This is "flossing" the heel both to set the angle and to make the joint tight against the body In this one I've rubbed pencil lead on the neck tenon and when it is fit into the body it will leave black marks where it contacts - those get carefully sanded until the entire joint fits tight Lastly, here is a trial fit with one clamp holding the neck into the pocket - all of the strength comes from the wedging action of the dovetail. Notice that this will be a slightly elevated fretboard - there is a little wedge between the board and the top of the guitar Now, because of the four picture rule, I have to start a new reply Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 15, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 15, 2014 OK, pucker up, take a deep breath, spread glue only on the dovetail and a little on the fretboard extension (we may want to take this apart some day) and clamp it together Exhale, open a nice adult beverage and wait until tomorrow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarcapo Posted September 15, 2014 Members Share Posted September 15, 2014 It seems like when it comes to pores, koa is the worst. I usually get good results with pumice and shellac. Rubbed in with a fad so it mixes with wood fibers to color match and forced into the pores.... and then sanded flush. I tried cyanoacrylate glue and it worked great...but the vapors almost killed me and it was kind of a sticky mess. One method I abandoned was simply French polishing over and over and sanding beck. The idea was to have a finish that was "all one".....but it takes forever and you end up with a thick finish after all that. I've tried pastes as well but I think they dull the sound and there's sometimes color matching issues. It's also hard to get the pest just in the pores and not anywhere on the surface of the wood..Epoxy is kind of in the same boat here. At least it's clear, but again I sometimes wonder if it doesn't dull the sound a bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mr Temporary Posted September 15, 2014 Members Share Posted September 15, 2014 I've been using this stuff with decent results, applied with a glue brush and pressed in with an old credit card. Sands back OK and doesn't seem to have a problem with shrinking back. I've done the pastes and the epoxy fills, too. Really hate the latter as it really doesn't work well sanding back to bare wood. Everybody I've seen that uses epoxy for pore filling leaves enough to coat without sanding through. Some of these builders are pretty well known and command decent money for their instruments, but I still have a mental issue with leaving that much stuff on the surface. The French Polish / pumice & shellac is one of my favorites as well, but tends to be a bit on the labor intensive side. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarcapo Posted September 16, 2014 Members Share Posted September 16, 2014 I've been using this stuff with decent results, applied with a glue brush and pressed in with an old credit card. Sands back OK and doesn't seem to have a problem with shrinking back. I've done the pastes and the epoxy fills, too. Really hate the latter as it really doesn't work well sanding back to bare wood. Everybody I've seen that uses epoxy for pore filling leaves enough to coat without sanding through. Some of these builders are pretty well known and command decent money for their instruments, but I still have a mental issue with leaving that much stuff on the surface. The French Polish / pumice & shellac is one of my favorites as well, but tends to be a bit on the labor intensive side. That Crystalac looks good but It looks very time consuming when it comes to curing. I like that the pumice and shellac dries fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 16, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 16, 2014 Obviously lots of ways to fill a pore. I'm using Z-poxy, it works and I think it has several nice features. I actually like the skulls on the truss rod cover and pickguard. They fit in with the rest of the design. Can't wait to see the finished version. OK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Verne Andru Posted September 16, 2014 Members Share Posted September 16, 2014 Looks bad-ass Freeman! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlackHatHunter Posted September 17, 2014 Members Share Posted September 17, 2014 Absolutely amazing thread. Thank you so much for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 17, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 17, 2014 This stage is call "in the white". The back, sides and neck have been pore filled and sanded back to wood, the top has been sanded thru the grades up to 320. It is ready for finish, which Jesse will do. In theory I could put the tuners and tailpiece on at this time, make a nut for it and play it, and originally we talked about doing exactly that, but at this time I think we'll just go ahead with the finish. Finishing usually takes four to six weeks - if I get any pictures from the paint booth I'll post them but mostly this is going into hibernation for that time. Feel free to talk about me, the guitar, pore filler, binding, skulls or anything else that comes to mind - I'll be reporting back in a month or so. Meantime I might start building that Les Paul junior.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ejcoglio Posted September 18, 2014 Members Share Posted September 18, 2014 Is the fretboard extension a necessity? I thought the end of the fretboard would be elevated but I see that you added a piece. Just curious as to your thoughts on that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members t_e_l_e Posted September 18, 2014 Members Share Posted September 18, 2014 6 weeks wait? no pictures? oh how will i survive? hmm what kind of finish aka color will be applied? is there any burst planned? personally i don't like sunbursts, cannot tell why. so i would prefer it as one color see through finish and i could imagine any color Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 18, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 18, 2014 Is the fretboard extension a necessity? I thought the end of the fretboard would be elevated but I see that you added a piece. Just curious as to your thoughts on that. On any guitar the plane of the fretboard (a line from the top of the frets) needs to be at a very definite location over the top of the guitar - usually just at the top of the bridge. There are a lot of reasons why - mainly to get the right amount of power to drive the top - the height of the bridge, amount of arching or curve to the top, break angle of the strings - all of that comes into play. I'm using a standard adjustable archtop bridge which kind of sets the height by its design, altho an ES-175 would have a ToM mounted on top of little ebony feet. Another minor but important consideration on an ES-175 is the clearance for the pickups (which I don't have to worry about). Anyway, the neck does need to be above the top by a small amount to make all of that work. As far as the fretboard extension and the little wedge under it - again, an ES-175 has a small wedge but it doesn't go all the way to the end of the fretboard - the end of the board is floating above the top. That is pretty common and in theory that lets a little more of the top vibrate. However most flat top steel string guitars have the f/b extension glued to the top all the way to the sound hole - doesn't seem to hurt their sound. In the final analysis we talked about floating the f/b but that would have made finishing under it a pain. I could have waited to install the neck until after the finish was applied but I felt I could do a much better job of setting it if I could sand after it was glued on. Took all of this into consideration and made the little wedge. 6 weeks wait? no pictures? oh how will i survive? hmm what kind of finish aka color will be applied? is there any burst planned? personally i don't like sunbursts, cannot tell why. so i would prefer it as one color see through finish and i could imagine any color I've already mentioned a couple of times some generalities about the finish but even I don't know for sure what Jesse is going to do. I've saved some cut off pieces of spruce and mahogany for him to practice on and I'm expecting to not be disappointed by the results. Both of us will just have to wait, I guess..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ejcoglio Posted September 18, 2014 Members Share Posted September 18, 2014 Thank-you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Grant Harding Posted September 20, 2014 Members Share Posted September 20, 2014 This is going to be the longest 6 weeks of my life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted September 20, 2014 Author Members Share Posted September 20, 2014 Ejcoglio, you are welcome. There are a couple of other ways to think of this - the bridge on a standard flat top steel string is about 3/8 thick and the saddle sticks out another 1/8 so the fretboard plane needs to be about 1/2 inch off the top. An archtop bridge or ToM is about 1 inch tall (with the knobs all the way down) so the f/b plane needs to be that much higher plus the arch of the top. What that means is that a flat top has the neck kicked back at about a 1-1/2 degree angle where a Gibson neck is typically at about 4 degrees. Fender gets around this differently by having zero angle but the entire neck stands proud of the body and the bridge isn't nearly as tall. Three different ways to skin the same cat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members t_e_l_e Posted October 4, 2014 Members Share Posted October 4, 2014 i know the 6 week are far away from over, but any news hows the baby doin'? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted October 4, 2014 Author Members Share Posted October 4, 2014 i know the 6 week are far away from over' date=' but any news hows the baby doin'?[/quote'] Haven't heard a thing - Jesse said he would call when he was starting the "special" part of the finishing. Mostly its just a time consuming process - many many coats with sanding in between, then many more. Then two or three weeks of curing before the final sanding and buffing (and believe me, its hard to wait...). Back in my street rod days we used to say that most of a lacquer paint job ended up on the floor, but what was left was dead nuts perfect. In the mean time I've started another build. Any interest? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knotty Posted October 4, 2014 Members Share Posted October 4, 2014 Ooh yes please. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members t_e_l_e Posted October 4, 2014 Members Share Posted October 4, 2014 In the mean time I've started another build. Any interest? sure always, its better then pr.n, cause you have a good story with it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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