Official Luthiers Forum!

First post here. I'm very near to ordering an OM kit from LMI. I'm having some of it done by them (sidebending, rosette, thickness sanding) so I don't have to throw down a lot of money on tools on my first build. As I'm planning this out, I'm coming up with several questions as to how to keep tool costs down and still achieve great results. One of my first, and very simple questions is this....I'm making a mold using L-hooks, as seen in the Irving Sloane book. What rubber bands will be best for the clamping pressure using this mold? I noticed some at Stew Mac, but they're designated for binding. Will these work?

I'm sure I'll have many more questions as I go, thanks for a great site!

Ryan

Are you building in a radius dish?

I don't know about the rubber bands, just that there don't seem to be many folks going that route.

My guess is the majority use a gobar deck which you can make mighty cheap from scrap.

I could post a pic. Gobars can be simple hardwood rippings of 1/4 by 3/4 by 36. Or like me, 5/16 hardwood dowels. Some folk use kite fiberglass ribs or farm fencing of fiberglass rods?

Good luck, you'll figure out how tight to get those bands. Staples or Office Depot may have those. Pick up some binder clips and you can do linings too.

Hey, You're in Missouri!

The best way to keep tool costs down is to sell that kit on Ebay and go buy you a guitar! I think I'm in for about $40 grand right now.

_________________
http://www.dickeyguitars.com

I didn't plan on using a radius dish. I'll probably use something else to achieve the same goal, without the cost. I doubt I can make my own radius dishes. I'll look more into building a go bar deck. That would be a simple way to glue the top/bottom.

I know the cheapest route would be not building at all hehe. I plan on building continually, and will acquire what I need as I need it. Starting out I want to get whats minimal, as my funds are minimal. I'll know whats necessary for me as I go, I suppose.

Thanks for the help.

A go bar deck is great, you can use it to clamp all kinds of stuff. If you use it to clamp the top and back to the sides make sure your mold will fit into it(don't ask why I brought that up).

_________________
Jeremy Douglas

Great tip. I wouldn't have thought of that, until....well

Ryan, welcome to the madness. Check your wallet at the door.

If you do some swimming through the archives, heck it might still be active, but there is a thread about alternatives to radius dishes. Someone suggest a package or two of index card spread out to act as shims and create the radius. I'm on my way out the door. If you can't find it let me know, I might have seen it on another forum.

_________________
Aoibeann

I did see this at Kenneth Michael Guitars http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/contourtool.html

I was probably going to give that a try. Thanks for the tip.

Glad to have another...

I agree that it is important to not pour money into something you may not really get into.
Every special jig and tool seems indispensable.... But they are not.

I would make your goal to not spend money *Unnecessarily*.... not to *Not spend money*
There are many specialized tools and jigs available. They probably work fine, but aren't mandatory.
I would recommend that when you do buy a tool -- get a good high quality tool (Used are fine,
except for saws... Used saws tend to not cut right.)

Check out Cumpaino and Natelson's Guitar making tradition and technology if you don't already have it.
Quite a bit of their stuff is done with minimal use of specialized tools and such.

For example....

You don't need a radius dish or a go-bar deck for your 1st.... unless you want one.
Tracing out a fair curve, then planing and sanding to the line works fine for making braces.
Clamping the shaped braces to the soundboard and back with plain old clamps makes fine glue joints too.

With a fully serviced kit ..... a High Quality Block plane and a good razor saw or a good Japanese pull saw are a must. You will need 1 or 2 good chisels -- 1" or 3/4" and a smaller one like 1/4" or 1/8."
I also recommend spending some money on a good adjustable T square and a good high quality metal yard stick with 1/50" and 1/100" and/or 1/32" and 1/64" graduations.

With build #1 -- don't try to focus on "Building a Guitar" -- It's too big of a "Task"
Your first focus needs to be "Start"
Focus on getting that 1st joint lined up and glued right.
Success... See, that wasn't so bad, was it?
Then focus on getting that next joint done correctly.
Success again...... Now, you're getting on a roll here....
Then focus on getting the waste material trimmed off and prettied up.
Then, when you find you don't have a tool you actually need... buy it at that point.

You can easily complete each one of the small tasks that makes up "Building a Guitar"....
and it makes the build a series of small successes rather than slogging through a giant swamp
of "Not Done Yet."

Good luck

John

Oh, on the rubber bands....
Most good office supply stores sell rubber bands of all shapes and sizes.
Off hand, I don't know what size they are -- but look for bigg-ish looking ones.

Good luck

John

Thanks for the tips John.

Yes seeing as I don't have much money to go to new tools, I'll do as you stated. Buy it as I need it. After several builds, I'll have a lot spent on tools no doubt, but this 1st one is going to be on a tight budget.

The method shown in the Stew-Mac video for their serviced kit is a low tool investment way to successfully build a first guitar. Their use of a cardboard semi mold and a specially angled sanding stick are at least workable. While I would not recommend this as an optimum method, it worked for my first. I would recommend their kit with a bolt on neck for your first.

Then I got hooked and bought all the tools and it still cost me many thousands! I'm working on 17 and 18 now. Happy building. It can be done!

Steve Brown

Great post! I would concur heartily with your sentiment of focusing on the build process for the first one...
I bought a LMI serviced kit for my first, and invested the minimal set of quality tools - and have used every one! My first build is almost done, and I was happy not to have struggled on shaping the neck or cutting in the rosette - that may have ended the project right there. Now that I have experienced the build process without any major mishaps, I know that I enjoy it, and have the second, unserviced, box of lumber on its way!

Well it came and I'm building now, every spare moment

I've decided to go with radius dishes. Its made it so much easier so far. I have the sides together and the bottom kerfing on. I'm using the form in the Sloane book using L-hooks, but I've already decided for the next one I'll build a more accurate mold that I can work from top and bottom without having to take the guitar out each time I need to work the other side. Things are going well though.

I'm about 2/3rds done with my first build right now. So, I'm by no means a pro, but I can tell you that I had problems using rubber bands to hold down the back while gluing. I wound up removing the back and using clamps to re-do it.



in the end, what worked for me, was having the rim in the mold while I used clamps across a few 2x2's to glue with equal pressure on the top. and I took the rim out of the mold to glue the back, using a whole bunch of 4-inch bar clamps.

rubber bands didn't give me enough pressure to hold down the areas near the neck block and tail block. it seemed like it was going to be fine when I tried it in a dry-run. but maybe taking the rubber bands off, and putting them back on again, took some of the "oomph" out of them. but i had much better luck with clamps.

_________________
"...you have to get over your strict adherence to your largely imagined notion of absolute perfection..."

Yeah I don't think I'll use the rubber band method. I'll probably use a Go Bar Deck for that. Thanks for the warning.