Official Luthiers Forum!

When we receive pur B/s goodies from our great suppliers do we:
Place on drum sander at 80 until we are ready to semi-finish at 250 (I'm not including the Rosewoods because of the reports that sanding results in the 'jucey fruit effect (GUMEY)' OR do you plane the b/s down further before the 80/250 treatment.

I sand via drum sander to final thickness including Rosewood. I keep a gum cleaner handy and use it after each set.

I hand plane all but the most stubborn woods close to final thickness, then use the drum sander to make sure everything is level. If my drum sander was better I would probably only use that for backs and sides. I usually only use a hand plane on tops because they plane so easily and it is an easy way to taper the thickness around the lower bout. Hand planing is also a great way to detect grain runout. Once the rosette is done I will level it on the drum sander. Final sanding is done with a random orbital sander followed by hand sanding.

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Hand plane tops but buy time on a thickness sander for B&S.

I like Arnt's method.

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JJ
Napa, CA
http://www.DonohueGuitars.com

B&S, Wagner then plane, tops just the plane. After that they are taken to final size in the sander. The small ones we tend to use; 10-20, 16-32, 22-44 and the like are really finishing sanders, not thicknessers, so that's what I use it for finishing only.

More and more now I'm doing as much as possible by hand, for the shear enjoyment of it.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

I hand planed & scraped the back & top for my first. When I bought the wood for the second I asked Steve @ Colonial to thickness it for me .

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nay

My blogs
Hand Made Gutar
Woodworker++

Marching to a different drum sander here - I use the Performax 10-20, put on the tunes inside my full coverage ear protection, and sit there passing the plates through the Play Dough Fun factory.

I just got my performax 10-20 plus. thats the way I plan on doing backs and sides. I have severe carpal tunnel. The hand planing is very painful anymore.

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Guitars, guitars and more guitars.

Thanks for the great info. everyone