News 2009

Tim Jones visited me a couple of weeks ago, bringing the mandolin he bought from my 'available now' web page. It's very early, around 1976, and in remarkable condition. Tim brought it for me to check and see if it required work, but it was perfect in every way. It hadn't been played much but I think it will be from now on.

Here is Tim with his mandolin.

Last week I travelled round my wood suppliers in the south of England and also visited the Acoustic Music Company in Brighton. Run by Trevor Moyle, along with with shop manager and outstanding guitarist Michael Watts, they import and stock the best of American luthier built mandolins and guitars. Musicians (and makers like me) are able to see, play and hear guitars we've previously only heard of.

Trevor and Michael are welcoming and patient. I spent half a day looking at guitars and listening to Michael demonstrate them. I took with me my latest Douglas Fir and African Blackwood New World model; it was fascinating to hear Michael playing  it alongside other guitars.

  At the Acoustic Music Company in Brighton with my NW guitar

Over the last week I've been reminded about the importance of oiling ebony fingerboards.

Ebony is a very dry wood which can readily absorb moisture from (and lose moisture to) the atmosphere. When this happens the ebony can expand or shrink more than the neck wood and thus bend it back or pull it forward. Much as a bi-metal strip bends at different temperatures.

The problem can be solved by oiling the fingerboard. This gives it a water resistant layer which inhibits the take-up or loss of moisture.

For many years I used lemon oil for this, but the latest acid-catalyst lacquer is not resistant to it, as were earlier versions.
If you were lucky enough to obtain a bottle of Squirroil (the manufacturers of which seem to have disappeared), this is ideal.  Otherwise I use walnut oil, a light oil which penetrates the ebony to some extent. I would also expect proprietory brands of guitar fingerboard oil to be effective.

Rosewood contains more oil, so should not be as likely to suffer this problem. Not that oiling rosewood fingerboards can do any harm.

This issue re-surfaced a week or so ago when a guitarist in the south of France called and said that after over a year of a completely stable neck, it had pulled back to the point of serious string buzz. This was just after the start of a period of heavy rain and humidity.

While adjusting the truss rod solved his problem, another change in atmospheric humidity would almost certainly require him to reverse this adjustment. Proofing the fingerboard on a regular basis should be a better long term solution.

My 14 fret Dreadnought is now lacquered and strung. I'll leave it a few days to settle before fitting its Highlander pickup and setting the action.

It is a little wider than the standard Dreadnought, and has the same body length as my 12 fret model. Most 14 fret Dreadnoughts bodies are a little shorter than 12 fret bodies.

Alongside is a Martin Simpson model body with side re-inforcement strips glued and clamped in place.

These are the first citterns I've built for a couple of years, ready for David and the spray booth. They'll be there for around a month, after which making and fitting the bridge, fitting the tailpiece and stringing up will take another week or so.

My apologies to those who've been waiting so long, but I'm making good progress. The next two citterns/octave mandolins are now also under construction.

When I've made inroads into my existing orders I plan to re-open my mandolin family order book.

Here you see the distinctive sweep  of the sides into the heel. This was a technique I developed when first building Appalachian dulcimers in the early 1970s and carried over into my cittern designs. This system has undergone three major revisions, the last in 2004.

After so long concentrating on flat-top guitars, I've returned to arch-top instruments with renewed enthusiasm.

Last weekend I visited Martin Simpson and saw and heard the African Blackwood New World guitar he collected just a week or so ago. He used  it (along with both MS Models) at his Queen Elizabeth Hall gig in London last Thursday.

Here is Martin trying to remember how to finger C major in standard tuning.

The African Blackwood sides on this Douglas fir topped New World guitar were a little too short.
So I fitted a panel (also of African Blackwood) at the tail, edged with maple and black/red/black purfling to match the rest of the trim.

Citterns under construction.

After a long period building only guitars, I'm now working on citterns again. I hope to have two ready for spraying in the next few weeks. I'll post pictures soon.

Double-decker guitar. 

I'm also working on my first dreadnaught in several years, and my first ever 14 fret dreadnaught.

Here it is ready for its fingerboard, after which I'll shape the neck, camber and fret the fingerboard, make the bridge, and shape it to the soundboard.

After final sanding it will go to David for lacquering.

Highland piper Duncan McGillivray called recently on his way to play at a wedding in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. He checked his pipes before setting off, not impressing the dog but greatly interesting cattle in the field behind.

Duncan is a champion piper known to many in the folk world as the piper with an early line-up of the Battlefield band.

Here is the neck, shaped and with the fingerboard levelled and cambered. and position markers inlaid. I checked the fret slot depths before fitting the frets.

Next I'll make the bridge and shape it to fit the curve of the soundboard, then I'll scrape down the sealing lacquer and final sand the whole guitar before giving it to David to lacquer.

Here the neck is fully shaped, smoothed and sanded. This is a Martin Simpson model neck so has the shallow C profile; the New World neck has a gentle V profile.

Here I've fitted the neck to the body, having driven in the main wedges and added more small wedges between neck extension and soundboard.

Below the neck is ready for its fingerboard, with clear tape protecting the truss-rod from glue and a dummy nut in place to locate the fingerboard lengthways.

Below right the fingerboard is glued in place. I use so many clamps not to clamp it tight but to spread pressure over the full area of the fingerboard.

Now the block is attached to the neck, I can cut the slots to fasten it to the body. Here the slots have been cut at the correct angle on the table saw.

Below are the neck with heel and block shaped (the block is shellac lacquered and stamped with serial numbers) and the body ready to receive the neck.

The necks started a couple of days ago are now ready for bodies, heads thicknessed and drilled ready for tuners, and rough heel-blocks attached. The heel block will be slotted and shaped ready to fit the body only when the correct angle has been determined from the body it will be joined to.

Behind are a set of New World sides just bent to shape and being left to settle, and in the go-bar jig are struts glued and clamped to a back.

I join the head to the neck with a scarfe joint, the strongest and simplest I know.

Here is the head glued and clamped to the neck. Because the pressure is at an angle to the joint and glue acts as a lubricant when first applied, I clamp pieces of wood at either end to stop the head sliding from its correct position.

Not a good photo - the spring clamps hold the head veneer in place while the glue dries. A plywood pad spreads the load and prevents damage to the veneer. The head will be taken to correct thickness after the tuner holes are drilled.

The neck cannot be taken to its final shape without its fingerboard; here the fingerboard is being slotted by being passed over a fine saw blade by a fret-slotting jig. The slots in the jig control the distance the fingerboard is moved each time for the next slot. This distance is detirmined by a pin which fits into slots on the jig. These are not the slots you can see, but another set on the far side of the jig.

After slotting it, I'll cut the fingerboard to size.

Here is one neck shaped to its fingerboard (and with the head also shaped) and another about to be shaped. This is done by running fingerboard and head template past a router bearing so that the cutter cuts the wood to the same shapes.

The fingerboards are taped on temporarily and will now be removed. They will be glued on permanently after the necks are fixed to the bodies.

David Wilson (the Gloss Boss) now has a website up.

Dave has been lacquering my instruments for around twenty five years (see my news item 5 April 2008) and has a wealth of experience in all areas of finishing. He also repairs and sets up all fretted instruments and builds custom electric basses.

Dave is a perfectionist in everything he does. His website address is:

www.dwilsonguitars.com

For the last 25 years I've used a primitive copying machine hooked up to a router to carve my rough carved arch-top soundboards . These rough carved tops are oversize to the point that I can adjust them to allow for the stiffness of the wood and desired characteristics of the finished instrument. The final details and thicknesses are carved by hand.

Because the copying machine isn't as accurate as I would like, I have to leave more spare wood to remove by hand than is ideal, just to allow for unintended variations by the copier. This adds to the work required and makes achieving consistant results harder.

I'm now working with Haydn Williams to carve these rough soundboards on his computer controlled routing jig. It's an amazing machine which can carve complex and detailed 3D designs. These range from the size of a small coin up to objects nearly four feet long. Haydn has built this machine himself with components sourced mainly from ebay, a remarkable achievement.

The rough soundboards Haydn makes are carved from my wood to my design, with my arching and basic thicknesses. I can then fine tune them in my shop later. We've been talking about this for over a year, and I'm looking forward to finally getting results.

I've realised for many years I need to be dragged, screaming and kicking, into the 19th century. So this is progress.

Rough carved soundboards as produced by my copier.

Early 1980s (I think) large mandolin

In the meantime I'm overhauling an early mandolin, of which I've had several to work on recently. Like many of my early instruments, this has a label but no date or serial number. From the telephone number (which has had digits added at least twice since) I believe it dates from the early 1980s.

It's in excellent basic condition, but needs a re-fret and new tuners. The tailpiece has been butchered, so I've made a new one (which has to match the existing holes in the tail).

The original bridge had been replaced by an ill-fitting unsuitable one, so I've made another which will also accept a Baggs pickup. Here is the mandolin after its refret, ready for some re-lacquering (neck, back and sides but not the soundboard) and then stringing up. Also shown are the new bridge, tailpiece and tuners.

I've used African Blackwood for back and sides on a couple of Martin Simpson models, now I've used it on a New World guitar. Before it's lacquered the grain is more visible; it's easy to see it's actually a rosewood rather than looking more like ebony as it does when lacquered and shiny.

Here it is ready for the spray-booth. Along with African Blackwood back and sides, it has the standard New World Madagascar rosewood neck and an Italian spruce soundboard.

African Blackwood made excellent MS models, but it doesn't follow that it will be as successful on the smaller New World. I'll find out in a few weeks when I string it up.

This weekend I visited Edinburgh and went with Rory Dowling of Taran Guitars to look at wood brought from Belize around 30 years ago. Some was a rather lightweight mahogany, some a rosewood looking very like Honduras rosewood, some was dark and immensely heavy, and some was light in colour with dark streaks.

I took just a little of the rosewood and pale brown wood with streaks. The rosewood could be suitable for necks while the pale wood is interesting but probably of no use for instruments.

Both woods pictured right.

The south of the UK has had the heaviest of our current snow, but here in the north it's been wintry too. Yesterday and today I haven't been able to get out to my workshop.

However, snow does make a great back-drop to birds at our feeder. Here are a couple of starlings. Generally unloved, but very pretty.

Dave Richardson commented on the froe I mentioned in a previous news item, and how few people must use one these days.

Here's a clearer picture of it, along with the hefty hammer I hit it with. The sharp edge is away from the hammer, of course.

The telephone gives an idea of size.

PS I've now been told the correct spelling is 'froe'.

Linings are the strips of wood re-inforcing joins between sides and top and sides and back. Linings are usually kerfed (partially cut through at regular frequent intervals) to make  them easy to bend.

I don't love kerfed linings. All those cuts can hold glue that can't be cleaned out, and also allow glue from fixing the bindings to run into the guitar. So I use solid unkerfed linings, which must be bent beforehand to the same curve as the sides.

Here are the top linings held in place with strong spring clamps while the glue dries. The body is held in the mould which in turn is held by my gun-makers vise.

This vise holds firmly in all positions, can be revolved in two planes and moved closer to or further from the bench. The most versatile vise I've come across, I obtained it from Dan Erlewine many years ago.

Right: the top linings are glued and sanded, and the side re-inforcements (really to stop damage spreading around the sides) are being glued in place. The top linings will be sanded smooth to receive the soundboard.

Below: cittern linings glued and clamped.

This has been the coldest winter we've had in the UK for many years. Fortunately, much of it has also been bright and clear.

This afternoon was so lovely I took a couple of hours out of the workshop and walked above Devilswater with dog and camera.

Coming back home, what looked almost like a fire was actually the sun so low as to reflect off the underside of clouds on the horizon.

This was taken around 3.30pm.

Guitar and cittern braces should be stiff and light. I don't use sitka spruce for soundboards, but this close-grained sitka is perfect for braces.

Here it is in rough pieces as collected from Roger Bucknall of Fylde guitars. Roger went through huge hassle to source it and get it into Britain and was generous enough to pass some on to me.

First I split it with a froe, a handle on a blade that you hit on the back with a big hammer. This means the wood splits absolutely along the grain, without the grain run-out you can get sawing wood.

Then I cut it oversize on either table saw or band saw, making sure to cut along the visible grain. Now I know there is no grain run-out in either sideways or up and downwards.

Finally I stack it in the warmest shelf in shop to dry thoroughly. When the time comes to use it, I will thickness it to exact size.

Behind it you can just see the tacky table-tennis trophys Liz refuses to have in the house.

New website

This website has the same basic format as before but I can now modify pages and upload news items myself. So I no longer need to hassle Jason to do this for me.

His patience in showing me the limited computer skills required is  much appreciated.

Some of the pages have been updated and revised; I intend to go over the remaining pages over the next few weeks. And I expect to post news items more frequently.

Mandolin family instrument builds

After too long building only guitars, I am now building mandolin family instruments again. While I still am not accepting new mandolin family orders, I hope to do so soon when I have made inroads into my order book.

My apologies to those who have been waiting an unexpectedly long time; thank you for your patience.

Here I am doing preliminary carving on a cittern soundboard