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Somehow I put this on the kit building thread I was wondering why I couldn’t find it







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Looks just as nice here as it does there.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Wow. Big guitar. Big wow factor. Looks beautiful. Would love to hear it.

Nicely done.
Lots of work in an Archtop that size. Curious how long it took you.
Friend of mine made one, said scrapering it out nearly destroyed his thumbs for a year.

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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.

This guitar took about 120 hours.....

I use mostly power tools for the "carving" starting with the Lancelot carver, followed by taking the rim down on my overarm router,then 36 grit on the 4" grinder,
Then various Festool sanders starting at 50 grit

I don't use a scraper or plane

I can rough carve a plate in about 3 hours.

I think maybe I asked you this question before Brad but any stylish ways of controlling the mess?

I use basically the same technique sans the Lancelot and have been unsuccessful prompting moving a lot of the operation outdoors for pulmonary hygiene:)

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Pretty cool!

I think he drilled and gouged it roughly before scraping.
But 3 hours WOW
Way to go!

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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.

Lots of ideas there. I don't look at guitars enough, certainly not in person! Wide, white fretboard binding always looks nice on archtops. So does that style of inlays. The board itself looks as smooth as plastic! Impressive. Inlay and binding on the f holes to match the fretboard. I like clear finishes too. How many times I've hid wood under color!

Bearclaw and silking, even on the back it seems. Cool.

Nicely done. I do like arch tops.

I've never measured how much time to rough an arch top. Only did the one. Roughing is MUCH faster than finishing, even with that much stock. I have a small one I want to do, but I need wood. Wood is hard to come by, unless you spend $250-500; EACH! I'm guessing about 2-3 days for a belly, and maybe up to 5 days for a back. I didn't pay any attention, I was just having fun. I use a big convex plane. I'm not a gouge guy. If I did it over and over, and the same general pattern, I could get faster. I'm always doing something new, so you have to watch what you're doing, I wasn't even Sur that my plan would work.

I do most of the finishing with planes until it gets real close. I like my thumbs. The I switch to scrapers. I ONLY use scrapers and planes, so I'm just the opposite of you.

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Why be normal?

It is a mess!
No way that I can figure out to attach a vacuum to it.
I tried it outdoors once,
But I need a solid bench to clamp it to- I use my big bandsaw table because it is in my power tool room so I don’t mess up my assembly shop


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Beautiful guitar!
Is the pickup mounted to the top or to the pick guard?

A cautionary tale on the Lancelot type chainsaw wheels:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIQu1e8DGUw

Beautiful work as usual Brad.

I want to build one of these so badly but cannot seem to have the time, which is a good problem to have, but still. I'm still quite intimidated by the whole thing too. Archies are a different animal for sure.

Another awesome guitar Brad. The details look fantastic. Like you, I went to power carving for roughing the plates out many years ago. A Kutzall disc has been my weapon of choice as it feels safer and more controllable to me than a Lancelot. I still use a Wagner Safety planer to rough out the "ledges" before hitting with the Kutzall and then finishing with planes, scrapers and ROS.