Acoustic Build in 10 days - Gav

[Gavin1393]

/<\\/p>[]<\\/p>/Quote from keloooe on June 14, 2013, 08:12
Nah Gav, you feel ancient now!

Quit while you're ahead Pest! :P

[keloooe]

But you have to teach me how to build an acoustic first :P

[MetalMatt]

Amazing set of skills you have there Gav - as I mentioned in DB's Baritone thread it must be truly satisfying to be able to create such masterpieces with your bare hands from scratch. It's all a bit over my head at the moment but I love reading/watching the progress. Awesome stuff.

[Gavin1393]

Thanks MetalMatt!

Day two of the build and we are getting ready to make some braces and put these on the back and soundboard of the guitar. The go-bar deck is going to be critical in this phase as we need to use the fibreglass rods to clamp the braces down onto the body.
What-is-more, these braces will be radiused and we will use a radiused dish with 40 grit sandpaper to achieve this and we will actually position the back and soundboard in the dish inside the go-bar deck to glue.
Also of critical importance is that the humidity needs to be at around 40-50% to ensure optimal gluing results are achieved.

You can see the radius in the dish below.

[Gavin1393]

I use a 15 foot radius for back plate bracing and I use a 28 foot radius for the front soundboard. These can be obtained like so much other stuff (the 40 grit circular sandpaper) from StewMac.

[Gavin1393]

I need to measure up the back to glue the braces into place. A strip runs along the centre line where the two back halves were joined. These are glued first. It is esier to measure up and get these pieces aligned if you use a ruler aligned to the centre markings.

When sanding to round off the centre braces, layers of tape alongside the braces will be useful for protecting the wood.

[Gavin1393]

Tape in place once the glue has dried!

Bottom picture also shows the profile of the central back brace.

[Gavin1393]

Glue the intermediate bracing pieces first. Once the glue has dried then shape the braces using either a thumb plane or sandpaper to produce a rounded curve. Allow these intermediate pieces to overhang the marked positions of the braces. This is to allow a tighter fit when the main braces are glued. Cut these extended pieces with a blade or chisel. When the main braces are glued you will need to use a 15ft radius template.

A softer piece of wood strip is positioned between the brace and the fibreglass rod to prevent the rod from denting or damaging the braces.

[Gavin1393]

Once removed from the Go-bar deck, you will be looking for this type of result!

[Gavin1393]

When it comes to gluing the sides of the guitar together, use will need a head block and a Tail block. The tail block is always something that can be decorated to add to the overall look of the guitar. It is also useful in hiding mistakes if you haven't quite bent the sides symmetrically!