Week 3 . . . Day 13

Welcome Visitor . . .

This morning we welcomed Phil’s wife Suzi to the workshop . . . she has come down from Sheffield to check on Phil’s progress and to foozle around the gardens of East Sussex.   But she can come any time as the muffins were lovely – thanks Suzi!!

Before we got under way we started comparing the three guitars.  Although they have been made from the ‘same’ woods (Indian Rosewood back and sides and Spruce tops) they are taking on entirely different characteristics – in colour, grain and texture.   Phil’s is very light and mine is quite red – whereas Patrick’s is somewhere in between.  And it was my turn to have a desk audit by the invigilator representing the Ancient Order of Luthiers - and to see if I am of sufficiently sound character to gain Associate Membership at the end of the course!  I wonder if bribery is legal here?

The best one is on the right



We normally put necks on our guitars in the UK

Luthier’s Trick 101 . . .

My first task for the morning was to continue looking for hairline gaps between the purfling, binding and the sides of the guitar.  Sometimes there are little variations in the way in which the woods have gone together and they need to be filled – and there is a pretty cool method.  You mark the spots, sand up some Indian Rosewood dust and brush it into the ‘gap’ and squeeze in some superglue – then more dust and glue and finally sand it smooth.  It works just like magic!

Superglue does a super job!

The Heel . . .

The next job involved shaping the heel of the neck to a rough shape so the entire neck can be attached to the guitar for further working.  So it was out with the template to get a rough lateral shape and over to the band-saw for cutting.  Richard has a very good trick for cutting around sharp corners with a band saw (and not twisting the blade too much) . . . cut little slots first so the blade is not biting too much wood at any one time.  Then it was on with another template to get a longitudinal shape and doing a ‘rough cut’ with the band-saw.

Marking out the heel

All set to cut

I learned another trick today

Makes going around corners easy

Half way



The shape of the heel



Another template

Technical Talk . . .

Today’s chat was about lacquers and finishing . . . and it would appear this is yet another dark art of lutherie and one about which there are many opinions.  Fundamentally, the objective is to give the guitar a ‘nice’ look protect it from minor bumps and perspiration so it looks nice for many years.  I will ‘reflect’ on this subject in more detail on a weekend blog . . . but for us doing this at home the advice is to keep things very simple – like using a polyurethane base coat and then spray cans of nitro-cellulose finish.  In the context of the course, Richard will be spending next Tuesday spraying our guitars (at a safe offsite location) with a quick drying nitro-cellulose lacquer and we will be French polishing our necks.

The Lacquer Twins

Don't do this at home

Or this

A good product

And another

Now you can all get back to work!

The First Meeting . . .

Now it was time to actually attach the neck to the guitar for the first time.  This is involved inserting little ‘Ikea’ like sleeves into the heel (after very carefully drilling the holes) and then drilling the holes where the ‘bolts’ go through the heel.  Once all that was done I put the bolts through the neck block inside the guitar and screwed it all together . . . although the neck will be off and on many times over the next week and a half.

Now the easy part was done, it was time get the guitar and neck perfectly aligned and flat from the top of the neck (where the nut will be) to the bridge (where the strings attach to the guitar).  This job involved planing, sanding and tweaking until no micro-cracks of daylight could be seen under the straight edge.

Attaching mechanism

All lined up

Houston we have contact

And a beautiful contact at that!

Back to the Neck . . .    

In most challenging endeavours you normally find a point where you find the edge of your competence . . . and I found mine today!  Attaching the neck to the guitar is quite important – not only would it look silly not being attached, any small incorrect angles are catastrophic in terms of the look and playability of the instrument.  Actually attaching the neck accurately requires making the finest of adjustment in exactly the right place so that it is exactly vertical (in every plane), will allow the strings to cross the guitar at the right height and that there are no hair line gaps between the two complex curves of the neck and the guitar.  For me it was like fixating on one instrument while flying in cloud – you can maintain a constant air speed, for example, but you might be flying upside down.  A constant scan of all instruments is required so the entire picture is kept in mind.  I would get one component absolutely correct with the neck, only to find something else was out, so I fixed that and something else then would be out, which when corrected put the first thing out again!  It was a virtuous circle of fun and I had to call for ‘expert help’. 

Actually watching Richard fix the many problems I had created was a thing of great beauty . . . this man has many years of skill and experience.  I followed what he was doing and could understand – but it was exactly where the next single scrape of the hand sanding block had to made (seriously!) that befuddled me.  It was such a delicate operation and it now fits perfectly – thanks Richard!



Calling 999!



Getting all the angles just right

Sanding to level

More fiddling

Fretboard . . .

The next job involved rough cutting the fretboard to length and then drawing a line down the middle (exactly!!) and attaching a ruler so as to ensure the extended centre line was true to a previously drawn spot marking where the middle of the bridge will be – and then clamping everything in place.  Once firmly clamping it all down (and checked twice – this bit is rather important) some marking holes are drilled through the fretboard and into the neck and tooth picks (locally called cocktail sticks – I think) are inserted and trimmed.

Fretboard in place - for the moment

Extending the Truss Rod Channel . . .

Now for a really scary bit . . . we need to extend the truss rod (an aluminum casing with a screw adjustment inside used to set up the guitar) channel into the body of the guitar.  In summary, this means taking to the top of the guitar with the router!  And just to complicate things further, the new channel needs to be 3mm deeper than the truss rod channel . . . so it was done very carefully while increasing the depth in very small increments.  But as I have said before – despite the router being noisy, brutal and unforgiving of mistakes, it does a wonderful job and leaves a lovely clean result. 

Once that was done I needed to trim the truss rod to size and extend the thread of the adjuster using a die set.  I have not used one of these for years and I was reminded how satisfying it is making a new thread . . . especially after some of the more intense jobs we have been doing today.

This could be serious!

Beautiful job

An easy task - finally

Truss rod adjustments

All ready for insertion tomorrow morning

The Others . . .

From what I could see, all three of us are within about ten minutes of each other so pretty much did the same things all day – sometimes twice!  And of course Phil had his work ‘quality assured’ by Suzi when she came back at the end of the day . . . somehow I think Phil has found his match with Suzi!

Hard at work

Our new friend - the neck holder

Exacting work



How nice it must be to have young eyes!



It's a great gag Phil!

Marking the fretboard

Lookout Richard - he has a drill in his hand!

More neckwork

It's still a great gag Phil!

Quality officer's inspection

A Night at the Theatre . . .

Tonight I went for a walk around the town and came across a play being performed in the castle precincts . . . which turned out to be Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor.  I chanced upon the best seat in the house – well, when I say in the house, I actually mean on the footpath that overlooked the ‘stage’.  However it was the best spot as it was where all the actors and musicians gathered to watch –and of course I got chatting to a few of them.  They are from the Little Brighton Theatre – a hard working and enthusiastic group of amateurs who put on about ten plays a year.  Their annual performances in Lewes are something of a local tradition – last year’s Romeo and Juliet was warmly received.  I will probably go along to the full performance in the next couple of days.

A lovely setting for Shakespeare - best to double click to enlarge