The circle of life?

I’m at that stage where I’m well into the polishing of Roland’s instruments; the shellac really brings the wood to life.

This is first time that I’ve used Pau Ferro and it really is a beautiful wood. Unfortunately for me I only bought two sets; if no one else claims the second set, I’m tempted to use it on the mandolin that I keep promising to make myself!

 So, as this project nears its natural conclusion, another starts. The next on my waiting list is a quilted maple Standard Plus which will be going off to Youhei in Japan.

Here’s the complete rim; the end graft is from a nice piece of burr walnut, although most of it will be covered by the tailpiece, I still like to pay attention to these small details.

And the neck; again lots of lovely walnut!

How to make a wood rosette

Over the past few years, I’ve made quite a few instruments with “wood rosettes”; they seem to be a popular alternative to abalone or plain lines. The grain of the wood ensures that each rosette that you make is quite unique and it’s relatively easy to get hold of small billets of exotic woods that can be used to make up stunning rosettes. Anyway, I thought I’d show you how I make mine.
I’ve been making burr walnut rosette for Jonathan’s 12 fret steel-string cutaway.
Firstly, I cut thin book-matched slices from a solid billet of burr walnut; commercially made, knife cut veneers are only 0.6mm thick which, I feel, doesn’t give you enough thickness to play with. Another alternative is to use the off-cuts from the back or sides and I’ve done this on rosewood guitars to good effect.

The thin slices are stuck together (edge to edge) with a waterproof glue and then temporarily fixed down to a work board with hide glue (water soluble- see where I’m going with this?).

I use the router, with my compass attachment that I made for it, to cut the recess that the rosette will be inlaid in to. Jonathan has requested a Sitka spruce soundboard and this board is a very nice one with lots of medullary rays- these are what give the soundboard that silky looking effect that some players drool over.

With the recess cut, lines of purfling and veneers are glued in place for the inner and outer rings. Once the lines have been glued in, I carefully measure the gap in between them and then use the router again to cut out the walnut circle. Next comes the fun part; using a hot knife and water to lift the ring off of its backing board without breaking it!

Once the ring is off, it can be glued in place and then cleaned-up; you have to be careful not to grind dark wood dust into the light soundboard.

Here we have one burr walnut rosette! On with the bracing........

Things have been quite busy lately!

I’m sorry that I’ve not been keeping the blog up-to-date; things have been quite busy lately. When we lived in London, hardly any clients called by- most of my business was conducted via emails. However, since moving to the wilds of Norfolk we have had many more visitors, resulting in quite a few new and interesting commissions, all involving much design work. I must admit it’s been great to meet so many new clients in person and hear them play their guitars and discuss their needs.

Andy’s hybrid archtop

I’ve finally completed the purfling and bindings on Andy’s hybrid archtop- I still can’t believe that it took me so long. However, I was grateful that my old tutor, Herbert Schwarz, made me cut all of rebates, on my early guitars, by hand and that I had that skill to fall back on. You can see the outcome below and despite the time I’m very happy with the outcome.

The parlour guitar

The parlour guitar is coming along nicely and the new video shows how I tackle the carving of the neck. The shape of the neck is one of the most important elements of the guitar regarding whether or not a player finds a particular guitar comfortable or not.

The next step is to start French Polishing the parlour guitar and there will be another video about that. Here are few picture of the guitar ready for polishing; there are a few details which I really like. I cut a tiny “N” logo out of a recycled Victorian ivory piano key and inlaid it in to the heel cap and I love these new side position markers.

The next instrument

The next instrument on the bench will be an English walnut steel-string guitar for Jonathan. Interesting spec- my model 1 shape but with a 12 fret neck and cutaway- more on this later, but here’s its beautiful back to be getting along with. Walnut can look a bit cold in this state, but when it’s polished you can’t beat it! Also I often leave the sap wood on to give a skunk stripe down the back, but Jonathan would prefer his back without and I’m happy to oblige!