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Has anyone had issues with using tentalones for the top/rim jointon a steel string?

Asking for a friend.

dl

That's what Sexauer does...

Only in terms of time consumption if you make them too small I like to have a selection from around 3/8" long for the waist to 3/4" for the lower bout, and sand them convex or concave to mate with the sides. I also make supersize ones for armrest bevels.

It's the way Charles Fox was teaching back in the 70's when I made my journey to Earthworks...

Dave

I have used them on steel string flat rimmed instruments built on a solera and never had a problem with them. You could probably space them like pickets on a picket fence and still not have a problem.

Rob Girdis did that on all of his guitars. Built on a Solara.

New username, same Pat Mac

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Pat

No, never any problems, also my preferred way of doing this job.

I switched to using tentallones several guitars ago and have not had any problems. What's going on with your friend's instruments?

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George :-)

Thanks all for responses.

I have a client who questioned the practice as I too have done this on steel strings and wanted some backup for the idea.

dl

I’d have a very had time with this. If someone wants me to make a guitar, I would seriously wonder why they are questioning my practice.... I wouldn’t want someone looking over my shoulder questioning every process I’m doing.

Dave, please feel free to tell me to delete this if your plan is to show your client this thread.



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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

For those of you who choose this method what do you feel the advantage is?
Just curious


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The method works well when you build guitars 'off the top' in the Spanish tradition. That is with an open work board (solera) in stead of a mold. You can place the bent sides along the outline of the guitar and clamp it down. Sometimes you have to push and pull the sides to get it to follow the line perfectly, once clamped it will stay there and then you set in the tentalones and it retains it's shape.

I've been thinking of gong in this direction as I do build off the top. I normally glue kerfed strips to the sides then clamp the whole assembly up but sometimes to the eye you can see a slight discrepancy. The thing is, it takes a lot more work to do it this way.There also seems to be a shift in thinking about guitar design to use stiffer sides with solid linings or reversed kerfed linings for better tone.

No need to fit the braces into the linings! And much easier to deal with side braces.

Seems like it is the preferred method when using a Solara.

And you get to use the word tentallones!

New username, same Pat Mac

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Pat

Pat gets it! Tentalone, tentallone, tortallino ... no matter the spelling they go well with a nice red sauce.

Personally, I started experimenting with tentallones (and Spanish-style building methods) after reading a somewhat casual reference to fractals. The "best" approach to building, of course, is whatever your ears tell you.

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George :-)

Sometimes I make the classic triangular shaped kerfed linings which at one point are rectangular. If they are of the right starting dimensions then in the process of making them triangular I generate tentalones from the off fall. Then the only wood wasted is the saw dust (unless I want to mix it with glue and make wood putty )

Tentalones make more sense when working on a solera than a kerfed 'ribbon' liner. They do take some time, but keep in mind that many of the old ways seem more reasonable if you consider wood to be expensive and hard to get, and labor to be cheap. You can make a lot of tentalones from leftover brace stock by simply cutting it into short pieces in a little miter box and splitting them in half along the diagonal. There's very little waste.