My Week in Pictures: Thursday, 10.28.10

Thursday, 9:00am

Over the years, I've gotten pretty good at working cleanly with regular wood glues. However, I seem to always make a mess with hide glue. This morning was all about clean up.



So, I hit the linings with a bit of sandpaper.


they're looking a bit better now.



With the top linings clean, I got to work on the back linings. Deja Vu.



Looks familiar huh!



11:00am
I finished up the linings and headed over to Guru. First order of business is to remove that hideous bridge from the Yamaha. I use a heat lamp to warm the bridge and soften the glue.



Heating up the bridge is patient work. You have to be careful not to heat everything too much! Aluminium foil helps to keep the temperature down on the top. Too much heat and you might loosen some of the bracing inside the body. I definitely want to avoid that!



It takes a bit of time for the bridge to warm up. I use a putty knife with the edges ground down to work it loose a little bit at a time.


A little bit here...



...a little bit there.



You have to take your time, and work your way around the bridge. As everything warms up the glue will release.




It's getting there...



We're close now!



...And there it goes. The bridge came off pretty cleanly, no major damage. Yay!




The next step is to fill the holes left by posts of the old saddle assembly. We are definitely getting rid of that!



I found a piece of rosewood that was close to the right size for the new bridge. The grain was a bit askew so I laid out the new bridge to match the direction of the grain.



First I straighten one edge, with a bandsaw cut...



and a quick trip to the edge sander.




Then I traced the old bridge.



And started to shape the new one.



Making the end cuts.



The rosewood blank was a bit too thick so I sent it through the sander. When I thought had it to the correct thickness I took the bridge back to the shop to check it on the guitar.



First I had to shave down the plugs which I glued into the top earlier. Lucky for me I sharpened my chisels yesterday!



With a straightedge on the neck I checked the clearance at the bridge. Everything looks good! Time to finish shaping the bridge and cut the saddle slot.




Back to the bandsaw...



And the edge sander.



On to cut the saddle slot. For the guitar to play in tune, the slot needs to be angled. There are probably better ways to accomplish this, but I've been cutting the slot on my router table with an angled caul. Don't try this at home!



But seriously, I just set the fence, and mark the width of the cutter onto the table.




I double stick tape the caul onto the bridge, and mark the length of the slot I want to cut. I then lower the whole assembly on to the cutter and mill out the slot using the reference marks on the table as guides. I should have taken a lot more pictures!



Here is the end result.




Then I drill out the bridge pin holes.




The final step is to fit the bridge to the top of the guitar. Unfortunately, the top on this guitar is plywood and it has badly deformed over the years. There is a huge hump behind the bridge...Check out the gap! ouch!



I begin the fitting process, by positioning the bridge on a couple of pieces of tape. Using a sharp xacto knife I cut through the tape around the bridge. I then peel the bridge shape out. Next I scape and sand away all of the old glue to create a fresh surface to glue the new bridge on. Once this is done I place the bridge back in position and scribe around it to get an idea of where to remove wood in order to make it fit the curve of the top.


Next I stick a piece of sandpaper over the bridge location, place the bridge on top and sand away. The sandpaper conforms to the top of the guitar so eventually the bottom of the bridge gets shaped to match, at least in theory! In this case I wanted to try and flatten out the bump in the top a bit. So I took the bridge most of the way, but left a little bit of a gap. I then made a flat caul to put inside the box under the bridge location. When I glue the bridge on, I will clamp everything down to the flat caul. When all's said and done, I hope the top will look a little bit better. One thing's for sure, this bridge will sound much better!


Here's the new bridge, next to the old bridge. The glue surface is prepared and everything's ready to go. I leave the tape on to help position the bridge during the glue process.



And there you have it! Let's hope I did everything right!






Tomorrow, we put strings on it and find out of all of this hard work paid off!

Goodnight!

6:30pm

My Week in Pictures: Wednesday 10.27.10

Wednesday: 9:30am

I had a rough time getting going this morning, but finally made it into the shop around 9:30. After taking the clamps off the neck and tail blocks that I glued yesterday, I started getting set up to glue the linings into the new archtop. Unfortunately, my chisels were a bit too dull. So I pulled out my stones and got to work re-honing the edges.



Looking a bit better now!



Back in business!



Here's the archtop ring after removing the neck and tail block clamps.



Because the sides are thin, there is not enough glue surface to hold the top and the back onto the guitar. The linings are added to make sure there is enough material the glue the top and back to. There are a few different styles of linings. I use a kerfed lining. The small cuts into the side of the lining makes it very flexible. In the past I've made my own, but it is very time consuming. Now I prefer to just buy them, they are cheap enough.



Gluing in the linings near the tail-block. I'm using hot hide glue, and you have to work very fast. Hide glue cures by cooling so, if you don't get the clamps on in time, it won't stick. This is the third guitar that I've used hide glue on and I'm starting to get a little bit more comfortable with it.


I work my way around the top edge one piece at a time.



The top edge is about done. Tomorrow, I'll start on the back edge.


11:45am

Back at Guru Guitars, I pulled out the Yamaha FG300 refret which I started yesterday. I finished truing up the fingerboard. The next step is installing the new frets.



I use a dremel tool with a very small bit to clean out the fret slots. It's really important to have all of the old glue and dust out of the slots before you install the new frets. If there is too much gunk in there, the frets will not seat. There will be small gaps between the fret and the fingerboard. All the hard work flattening the fingerboard will be for nothing.


The fret wire we use, comes in a roll. I cut each fret to size before I install it.



Here's a freshly cut end. The round part on the top, is the Fret. The part below is called the Tang. This is the part which gets hammered into the fret slot in the fingerboard. The small triangle shaped thingys on the tang dig into the wood and theoretically hold the fret in place. It doesn't always work!



Because this guitar has binding on the neck, (Binding is the white stuff around the outside of the fingerboard)I have to undercut the tang on each side of each fret. I use a small pair of nippers...



...And then file it smooth before I install the fret. It gets repetitive, but that's part of the job.




Getting ready to cut the next fret.




With the fret installed, I trim the ends flush. Snip, Snip...easy!




Fret's in. Only a few more to go!



2:00pm
Sometimes you have to shift gears abruptly here at Guru...This afternoon one of our regular customers came in with his PRS. He gigs almost every night of the week, and last night his PRS developed a phantom electrical issue. The bridge on this guitar has piezo elements under each string for an "acoustic" sound. Unfortunately, the B string on said bridge started to intermittently cut out. We had a few guesses about what the problem might be, but we couldn't get the guitar to mess up in the shop...Hmmmm...I hate when that happens! We have a two week back log of repairs right now, and we don't usually jump people to the front of the line. However, on occasion, we make exceptions for working musicians. So I put away the Yamaha refret and got to work fixing...something...I'm not sure...



I cleaned the connections between the bridge and the preamp, and after, what seemed like a mighty struggle, pulled the electronic guts out of the guitar. I looked everything over as closely as a could. I found a few suspect solder joints on one of the many tiny circutboards and fixed them. (I forgot to take a picture...sorry!)
I really hate it when I can't pinpoint the problem. I have no idea if I fixed the issue or if there even was an issue with the guitar at all! Time will tell!





Part of the deal was that he wanted the guitar cleaned up really well.
So I got to work polishing up all of the hardware.




I got it all back together. Problem solved!...I think. Gulp!


4:45pm
With the PRS safely in its case awaiting for the return of it's owner, I got back to the Yamaha.

In a perfect world all of the frets would be perfectly on the same plane after fretting, But no matter how careful I am, I've never been able to make that happen! In fact, very few people can make that happen! So, it's common practice to level the tops of the frets with some sandpaper and a really straight block. This process creates flat spots on the tops of each fret which then have to be re-rounded. I do it kind of old school, With a home-made file and brass fingerboard mask. I learn this technique from Ralph Novak and I love it! Thanks Ralph!.




Then I clean up the fret ends with a file.





With the frets leveled and crowned. I polish everything out with some fine sandpaper and a block.




I finish with a coat of danish oil to seal the fingerboard.



Looks purdy!




Yes Sir!




Tomorrow, that bridge has to go!



7:15pm
Dinner time, I've been hungry since 3! Adios!