Official Luthiers Forum!

I should be able to make minor changes using a hot pipe on laminated sides do you think? I've got a set of rosewood/maghogany/rosewood laminated sides and just want a little more bend in the waist to make the lower bout wider.

IF anyone has tried it before it would be nice to hear success or failure stories.

What did you glue it with? Just remember that high heat makes glue come unstuck - you might get bubbles in the laminate.
You couldn't add a wider end graft to pick up some width?

The glue is unknown though I believe the sides came from Martin so if anyone knows what glue they use. The size of the end graft is not an issue since there is plenty of extra side length at the heal. What I have are OOO sides and I want to make the upper bout smaller by bringing the sides in closer together and then bend the waist out so that the lower bout is still OOO standard size of 15 inches. If I rotate the upper bout on an axis that is at the waist then that works fine size wise except that then the angles the sides make at the headblock are all wrong and so it would need to be rebent there as well. Forcing it is just too much.

I had a set of laminated sides recently that I used for a different body shape. They were curving inward at both ends. I was able to flatten most of the bottom end using the tail block, and the rest of the over bend with the end graft. The head block also forced most of the over bend out at the top end, and installing the neck will hide the small amount remaining.
I laminate with West system epoxy. I once tried rebending the side of an octave mandolin using heat (a fair number of years ago). It delaminated - a bubble formed between the laminations. It wasn't a great loss. The virtue of laminated sides ,great stability,is also their drawback

Ok that's what I wanted to hear, from someone with experience. Sounds like it's not worth the try. Force fitting is a better option. Thanks.