Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

John, That looks great! How were you able to drop the main air that low? I'm primarily building with a Hauser plantilla and my air resonance is usually around 102 HZ and I would like to drop it some. Looking at Trevor's sensitivity analysis it looks like sound hole diameter and back stiffness are m...

As always nice looking work John. As always I am interested in the falcate bracing. You presumably beefed it up a bit for the extra strings so I wonder what height you ended up with? I wonder if you have had time yet to look at resonant frequencies, and perhaps particularly with this one, the bridg...

Thanks Mark, The neck wood is mahogany, I think the light hit it funny in the picture. I build for a customer, but take no deposits. My thoughts are I will try and if I succeed and they still like it they can buy it. If not well it was just like a private build. It has been awhile but she is all str...

I am ready to start cleanup and finish prep on this Bocote\Lutz spruce 8 string crossover commision. The 2 extra strings will be bass strings. I will have to play to see how low to go. The player would like to go down in fourths from the low E. I know I can make the 7th string a D and the 8 string a...

I am not sure it is Q, but when I took a voicing class from Jeffery Elliott a Portland Oregon classical guitar builder, he taught that he consistently thicknesses all of his top spruce panels for evaluation. Then on tapping he wanted to hear it ring for 5 seconds. It seems like the sustain would be ...

Nice work on this guitar. It was interesting to see it built on a work board instead of an outside mold.

I was feeling groovy, All and all it was a easier process. When I carved away parts of the braces I found no gap between the brace and the CF or the CF and the top.

On my latest guitar I am slotting the bottom of the falcate braces for the carbon fiber. It really made the glue up process go a lot better for me. At the Guild of American Luthier auction I bought a router base\table called the Otter by the maker of Luthiers friend. http://www.luthiersfriend.com/aO...

Too much room noise

I tried again this time with the mic a AKG C1000S, about 250 mm away pointing at the 12th fret

https://soundcloud.com/johnparchem/gore ... take-two-3

here is the Martin 00 sized falcate through the K&K pickup.

https://soundcloud.com/johnparchem/kandk-pickup

I have been go back and forth between no masking and masking most of the bridge area and clearing to a scribed cut. Of those two options I am leaning toward mask most and cut to the line. My experience: If you mask inside 2-3 mm and after finishing you scribe the bridge outline with a sharp scalpel,...

I am about ready to ship my latest Falcate braced steel string so I thought it worthwhile to record the difference between the two falcate SS guitars that I still have: My WRC\Cocobolo Martin sized 00 and my Spruce\Koa Gore medium sized SS guitar. As an additional bonus I recorded the same tune on a...

Whoops forgot to post the final spectrum graph. Everything is not exactly where I had hoped but the guitar sounds great, my target T(1,1)2 was 180 Hz and I am at 181-182 Hz with no mass. Also nothing is right on a note (but the air is close). The back is not super responsive but it does couple. I go...

I am still a novice looking at these but here are my thoughts. If I look at the red it looks like your top and back are pitched close together with that double peak. If the peak around 220 Hz is the top resonance, it will move away from the back when the bridge is glued on; a good thing. If the back...

I finished this guitar. Falcate braced western red cedar top Cocobolo back and sides Australian blackwood bindings Brazilian Rosewood bridge and headstock veneer Post Catalyzed Royal Lac finish http://www.harvestmoonguitars.com/falcate00_12fret/fallcate00%20(468).jpg http://www.harvestmoonguitars.co...

Thank you for all of these walk throughs!

Thanks! I made some progress. Since the last post I sprayed the guitar with post catalyzed Royal Lac a hardened shellac product. While the finish was curing I laid up a Brazilian Rosewood bridge blank with two sheets of 5.7 OK 3k plain weave carbon fiber sheet. While I was at it a laid up a blank fo...

I am planning a classical guitar using a US wood Osage Orange for the back and side at the request of a client. I found a set that is pretty well quarter sawn (I suspect the trees are not wide enough to be perfect across the width). The wood is very dense and stiff, some compare it to BRW but I am f...

Thanks ernie! I finished the pore fill with zpoxy and the grain really pops. I will seal the zpoxy was a few wash coats of shellac and ultimately spray post catalyzed Royal Lac. http://harvestmoonguitars.com/falcate00_12fret/fallcate00%20(358).jpg http://harvestmoonguitars.com/falcate00_12fret/fallc...

RIght before I left on a one month road trip I decided I needed to make a new neck. Using a chisel I tore out part of the heel on the side of the neck that runs along the cutaway join. The neck I made will be easy to convert to a more classical heel on a future guitar. Making the neck mostly was don...

Moving on to the neck ... When I build my last guitar I had a neck roughed in with with the tenon and brass inserts installed. I did not use it as I wanted a higher heel for a tradition classical heel. It was cut just right for my cutaway heels. So I got a head start. I have found it a pain to taper...

whoops binding is Australian Blackwood not African.

Thanks Dan, I have two bengals, they are nutty cats but a lot of fun. I got the guitar bound with african blackwood bindings and on the top I added wbw purfling. The purfling uses maple for the white so it is not a stark white that one gets from the white fiber used in some purflings. Twice I tried ...

I have finished the top bracing and closed the box. So far things look and sound good. I think I may hit 180 Hz on this guitar. I will have a better idea after I bind the guitar but right now the top resonance is 193 Hz. From the last post I epoxied the smaller braces on and then laid CF tow on all ...

... This tool from LMII is IMHO, one of the neatest channel cutters on the market, super clean edges Steve http://www.mirwa.com.au/HTS_Install_Rosette.html ... I have the LMI channel cutter and have had good results when used properly. One issue I have is that there is a tremendous amount of backla...

As usual John we appreciate the trouble you take to document the build. I wonder what height you have taken the falcate braces to? Trevor I think suggests7 mm for his particular design for a SS...? Also I may have missed it but what thickness have you taken the back to given that you want it to be ...