Building your own guitars

[empty71]

de Jonge makes awesome classicals, one of the better classical makers from Canada.

When you say seal the bridge with CA, do you mean applying a *thin* layer of CA on the underside of the bridge? Or to the other parts of the bridge?
I've sealed the other parts of the bridge with epoxy resin (zPoxy) but left the underside bare (don't touch what you don't know, yet). My greatest nightmare is a flying bridge when bringing the guitar up to pitch.

Cool Have you tried a de Jonge guitar? Sergei's very revolutionary in his building and I love the tone of his latticed-braced classical. They're a pain to build tho.

What I meant in sealing the bridge in CA is the top of the bridge. Instead of pore-filling, you can use CA to fill the pores. This adds strength to the Rosewood and you have the density of Ebony without the weight. Hope I'm making sense here

If you don't mind my asking, are you a local or Malaysian?

 

[iwanttobebach]

OK - I understand now!

I haven't had the pleasure of playing any of the de Jonge classicals, much as I would like to. Besides, I think my playing won't do it much justice. Which is one reason why I'm deciding to build classicals at least right till the point I can notice the subtle differences between what I make and say, a Bernabe or a de Jonge. deJonge's guitarmaking course seems attractive, but at CAD$4000 (without room & board), I'd have to make many guitars and work many years to justify the cost.

I think lattice-braced guitars are pretty much the "in-thing" nowadays, very loud, piercing volume, at least from the Australian school of thought, championed by Smallman (and of course J. Williams). IMHO, Smallman's "toilet-seat" design is quite a radical departure from what used to be the norm - but from the little that I've heard, his bracing design pretty much adopts a trial-and-error approach in that if the carbon-reinforced balsa lattice, when attached to the *very* thin top doesn't sound *just* right, he'd have to discard the entire top. It's a hit-and-miss kind of design. Nevertheless, the guitar could always do with more revolutionary ideas as underlined by de Jonge and Smallman (as well as most Aussie luthiers like Simon Marty, Jeremy Locke, Z. Gnatek and Graham Caldersmith).

But to be sure, I guess I'm pretty much a traditionalist, at least for now I'm trying to fully understand the little nuances of the basic design that underlies the Torres/Hauser bracing pattern, whose fan bracing has more or less withstood the test of time for almost a hundred odd years. Of course, there have been variations, 3/5/7/9 fan bracing with different focal points, but the basic design is essentially still fan-shaped.

I'm M'sian, but have been in Singapore for eons now, half my family (mum's side) is Singaporean, so I think I'm on the way to becoming one. I think of myself as local though - we're all brothers united by our love for the guitar.

 

[gsonique]

ai fellas give us cool electrics please :wink:

 

[tany]

chim talk man. chim.

 

[Black_Death]

tany...its called the luthier's talk..

wait til u hear wadeva lingo they have.u'll go... :smt017 :smt104

 

[le_Doucereux]

Dude, that's some beautiful work, man.. Great stuff!!

I'm largely confined to electrics and limited effects, myself. Don't have the tools and equipment to go about doing my own necks and bodies from scratch so I stick with just ordering necks and bodies and doing the rest of the assembly myself. Like you said, addictive. I also spend more time messing about with the innards of my guitars than I do actually playing them.

If you don't mind me asking, where do you get your tone woods from?

 

[bockscar]

whoa. thats alot man.

 

[edder]

ok time to be dodgy.

I've got a double storey house in a guarded community at Taman Bukit Indah for rent.

Any aspiring guitar builders wanna rent it and build guitars there? :lol:

 

[iwanttobebach]

Interesting replies!
Sorry about the 'lingo'. It's become a second language for me in recent months.

le_Doucereux: I get most of my woods from Luthiers Mercantile International (LMII) in California. They really know their stuff, and from the limited experience I have with them, they're all good. They package the woods well, and shipping is pretty reasonable. I guess woodworking projects in Singapore are not really popular primarily due to the lack of space (and possibly time), for which you need, lest you annoy your neighbors and the police get called in.
Yes, sometimes men like to tinker with many variables to alter the possibilities, through building and constructing things. That's why we (at least me) work on Tamiya cars when young.

edder: I'll have to pass on that offer. I want a farm. Really, nothing beats having lush pastures with horses, sheeps and cows grazing outside your workshop.

 

[gsonique]

I'll have to pass on that offer. I want a farm. Really, nothing beats having lush pastures with horses, sheeps and cows grazing outside your workshop.

oh my you are deep in it buddy ....deep 8O