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Would you mind measuring the angle from the back to sides at the neck block and let me know what angle you come up with? Thanks.

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I measured a few. I get 94 degrees plus or minus .2. I had one outlier at 96.1. It’s determined by the 15’ back radius and how square the block is in the mold when I sand to the back radius.

I just measured 4 of my boxes. Sometimes I do a more drastic taper from the waist forward and sometimes it is more of an even taper from tail to heel. I came up with 93,95,97.5 and 98 degrees.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I'm sitting at right around 97 degrees on the guitar I'm building right now (non cantilevered neck and pretty big difference in depth between upper and lower bout))--on cantilevered neck examples, I'm at more like 92 degrees.

Dave

94.5 deg

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-Marcus
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91.5 degree

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
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You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

My opinion:

This answer is going to vary and its use at a standard is questionable to me - - - what that angle does is present the fingerboard plane to the bridge, and missing from these measurements is the extent of soundboard dome at the bridge. Geometry at journey's end is what's being achieved, not an intermediate measurement that does not consider the last bit of the trip.

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Peter Havriluk

I suspect Chris is trying to get a range for some aspect of a jig he’s building or has built.

~94 on the three I have here. All D shaped, if it matters.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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I don't think I understand the question. Are you asking about the angle between the surface of the back and the surface of the side where they meet at the bottom of the neck block as in the diagram below, or are you asking about the angle between a line connecting the bottom of the tail block and the bottom of the neck block and the surface of the side at the neck block? Or something else?

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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

This angle:

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You can get that angle by drawing out on construction paper the combined impact of two things: The chosen taper from tail to neck, and the chosen back radius. Right? Just draw it out and measure. But it will vary, depending on both of those variables.

Not always. I sometimes taper my back with a constant taper from tail to heel. In that case it is as simple as the taper and dome. Some of my backs have essentially two tapers. There is a taper from tail to around the waist then the taper increases from the waist to heel. I sand the lower bout in the dish and the. The upper bout in the dish fairing into the lower bout at the waist. Since the braces are all done In the dish too, the actual shape is complicated.

I think the only reason the actual angle matters is when you are trying to cut the end of the heel to match the back. I suspect Chris is developing a tool to help with that and he is trying to figure out the parameters he needs to be able to cover.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Do people do this? I radius the bottom of the head block to match the 15' radius of the back. (In fact,that's exactly what's happening in my avatar photo to the left <===). Which gets to why I wasn't sure I understood the original question. On my instruments, there is no single angle there to be measured at that junction of the two surfaces because I have the convex curved surface of the back joining the vertically flat surface of the sides even under the head block. I could try to measure an angle but the answer would depend on where the arm of the angle gauge contacted the surface of the back. The measured angle would be wider closer to the corner and narrower further away from the corner because the arm resting against the back would be on a tangent to the curve of the back.

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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

95.5 degrees - Wedged OM, 12' back radius, ~18mm taper neck block to tail.

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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.

Good guess... but no!

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
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c'm on man, don't hold us in suspense!

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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.

When you lay your "angle finder" and try to measure that all you are doing is guessing at the relation or intersection (P.I. for engineers) between a straight line and a curved surface with no tangent line described for the curved surface.

94-96

Pat

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Pat

Thanks everyone! That's exactly what I needed.



Can't just yet. Still in development. If it tests out, it'll likely be a 2021 release.

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