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Originally sold to me as Dalbergia Negra by a guy on Ebay I later learned that this was Dalbergia Cultrata. A. Hix had the same experience with the guy. While I was initially disappointed with the transaction I'm now pretty happy with it after milling and working with it. Anyway here are a couple pics of my progress with this little guitar. The OM design and bracing design are my own.







Rosette is maple and spalted sycamore. Too late to cut the semi-circle out tonight but looking forward to doing that tomorrow. I anticipate plenty more mistakes and mishaps along the way, feel free to chime in and stop me from shooting myself in the foot!

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Looks like a good set in any case. That is a nice start I am looking forward to seeing the finished and installed rosette.

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Thanks, here's the rosette. I think I'm just going to go with a circle and lop the rest off. Sleeping on it. Installing ebony rings on the in and outside tomorrow either way.

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Homemade double stick tape.



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Looking good! I like the tiles sticking out, especially if the fingerboard is going to overlap that top one just a bit. But a regular circle would be good too, and certainly is easier to route for. If you do keep the irregular pieces, score around them and then take a knife and press down on each dark grain line to cut through them before routing. Or you may be able to do them all at once with a chisel since it's all straight lines (keep the bevel toward the part that will be routed away, for a cleaner edge). Without cutting the dark lines first, the router gets all jumpy and it's hard to keep it gapless.

Thanks Dennis, the segments were sticking out on the inside as well but I elected to route them off. I though about maybe adding an abalone inlay inside of ebony like the wood pieces for the 4th tile. It's either that or a regular circle. What do you score with? I haven't been happy with past results using a razor blade. I was thinking of honing a small chisel and using the corner to score and then a wider on to make the scores deeper.

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Good choice removing inward sticking pieces. Sometimes that can be cool, but on this I think it would just look cluttered. And by 4th tile, I assume you mean bottom center? Hmm........ yeah, I think that would be pretty cool. Especially if it's green abalone, so it's not quite as much of a color contrast to the rest. Shiny and interesting, but doesn't steal the show from the other tiles. Wish I could go back a few days and stick a piece in the box with the fingerboard before mailing it


I use the StewMac inlay scribe, which is just an overpriced pointy piece of metal. You do need something that can get right up on the piece, and not be offset from it by a blade bevel. A chisel corner won't be able to get into corners very well, but otherwise would work. If you can find a piece of spring wire, like out of the rim of an old mattress, that would be good to make a scribe from (maybe chuck it in a drill and spin it on a diamond stone until pointy?). Piano wire should work too. Heck, you could just sharpen a nail, though it would need resharpened more often than tool steel.

A knife is fine for deepening score marks, after removing the piece.

Mitre cutting realtively thick circular ebony rings proved to be too much of a PITA and I was running out of strips. Went with this instead.

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Can't decide on the binding choice. Mahogany, ebony or rosewood. Can't decide if curly maple would be too light and look tacky.



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Sides are notched to attach the back. Just have to do some final fitting then carving the soundboard braces.

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This morning I removed the previous X-Brace and added these plus a tone bar notched into x-brace and a BRW bridge plate. Bracing is sitka. This sinker redwood top rings like a bell but the cross-grain stiffness is not there. I wish I could have gotten that glue up a little better around the bridge but it will have to wait until morning. These go bars suck. They go off like a mouse trap and break things if they fly loose.

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UTB installation. I do this one this way due to the integral neck block design. I prefer to flatten the upper bout during the building process because I like to work thin and not have to worry about sanding the soundboard to the point that it's integrity breaks down. This sinker redwood top is already around 1.05"- 0.98" depending where you look, which is already thinner than planned.

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Thanks to whoever made the 18 wheeler tire one of my favorite and most reliable tools.


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UTB pic didn't show up. I do the installation backward due to the fretboard extension. It is fitted and glued to the ext and notched and glued into the sides after the upper bout has already been flattened. I work thin (0.095"~.010") so that I don't have to worry about flattening the upper bout later, which in my case might threaten the structural integrity of the instrument.

Soundboard attached and ready for tuning.

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For me the only thing more satisfying than closing the box is stringing the guitar up and jamming out a tune. Merry Christmas everyone and cheers! Box closed.

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West system epoxy

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What's the cure time on this. Still tacky and there is nothing on the can.

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I really like your rosette design and it looks really good with the redwood top. Have you decided what to use for the binding?

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter