My acoustic guitar build

fergal.b

As a little winter project I had a go at building a guitar from a stewmac kit, although I come from a very musical family I have not got a note in my head except for maybe a bad rendition of "Patricia the stripper" I know nothing about guitars or building one but they seem to go hand in hand with a lot of boaters and boats are my thing so here we go.

To start with I built a "go bar deck" this will be used for holding parts in place with fibreglass rods, I will be using bamboo plant holders a lot cheeper.

Go bar deck.

Clamping the sides together.

The sides are formed around two cardboard cutouts that give a good strong base.

Marking the sound board for the bracing.

This is where the Go bar comes into play, with the small sticks you can see clearly where the bracing goes and it also makes it easy to clean any squeeze out glue.

Soundboard done and bracing shaped, this is an important part of the build and there are experts that listen to tapping sounds on different parts of the board and shave a bit more off the bracing to get different sounds, I just tapped mine and it sounded like someone tapping on wood so I'm happy with that. 🙂

Pre cutout for the rosette.

Rosette in, there is a little gap at the top but that will be covered by the fret board.

Pegs holding the kerfed linings.

On the bottom board I used a scrap bit of wood with a curve sanded into it so it would hold its shape. The back and sides are rosewood and the top is sitka spruce.

Made the neck from some scrap wood.

Just kidding, I made a sanding board with a 5 degree angle to mach the back board.

Cutting out for the bracing to pass through the body this will later be covered by the binding.

That should hold it.

More bracing added to the sides.

Just need to clean up the edges now and that will be the body mostly done.

Started on the fret board marking out for the pearl inlay.

Cutting the fret wire.

It took me a while to find a hard enough bone to make the nut and saddle but this should do. 🙂

getting ready for the thrust rod.

Installed the push me pull me rod "truss rod"

Shaping the neck in the style of a Martin guitar Birds Beak .

Installed the side dots and coated the neck in boiled linseed oil, from what I have read a very high gloss finish would make the hand stick while playing.

Nerve wrecking time routing out for the binding and herringbone purfling, I didn't have a router to fit so I had to grind one down and swap the bearings then rapped a bit of tape around it to get it to the perfect size.

Marked out the start and stop points that go with the grain, routers are very powerful things and can easily mess up a job if it goes wrong it happened when I was doing a test piece the bearing flew off and bit chopped up the test wood so I put it back on with lock nut. This cut is for the purfling.

And now you can see the cut for the binding.

The back is just cut for binding, all went well and I can breath again.

Also cutout and glued the end cap in place.

Tacked in place with super glue, when I seal coat the guitar with epoxy it will fill in any gaps and hold it all in place.

First few coats of epoxy resin to seal the wood. I think Kyle is keeping an eye on me 🙂

I will now sand this back with 320 grit sand paper.

6 coats of Halfords lacquer later.

All done, another 6 coats let sit for a few weeks then sanded from 800 grit all the way to 12,000 grit then rubbing compound and wax.

fergal.b

A little bit of how it sounds by a girl just learning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n19xxxExM3E

aero2k

Lovely work Fergal sounds as good as it looks. How long did it take?

Stewmac are not cheap but their stuff is excellent.

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118319373#Comment_118319373

Thanks I started in September. Yep not cheep but good wood and matching that made it even more nerve-racking one mistake with the router a it could be a mess if I was ever to do it again I would get the router jig and bit from them also you don't even know it will play till you are finished and that's a bit daunting.

Thargor

That's an amazing job, jealous of your skills.

Enjoyed that! Out of interest is the bone is taken from the skull of a musician, or does that matter?

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118323531#Comment_118323531

Not sure if it has to be a musician but they have to have been in tune with their inner self.

loyatemu

amazing stuff Fergal, just don't take it out on the lake!

pjdarcy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118323531#Comment_118323531

Drummers skulls work best. They tend to have very thick skulls 😋

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118323929#Comment_118323929

Would I 😀

biketard

Amazing, Fergal. That is one lovely looking guitar.

martinedwards

speaking as someone who has built 90 instruments from scratch......

that looks EXCELLENT!

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118327486#Comment_118327486

Thanks that means a lot, I am still learning about it I was looking up tuners and was very surprised in the price difference £5 from China and £200 from stewmac I went with the cheeper ones first and they did work but as expected were not great quality so I ended up going for a mid range set of Washburn ones, same with the strings I bought a cheep set as I had no idea if it would even sound right two of those strings snapped today so now I have ordered a set of D'Addario EJ11 12-53 80/20 and a set of D'Addario XT phosphor bronze xtapb1253 light 12-53 Im still not 100% sure if theses are the right strings for this guitar as the cheep ones did sound fine to me.

Thargor

Did you build that model boat aswell?

dmc17

Looks great, fair play! I had a wtf moment at the "Made the neck from some scrap wood." step 🤣

I'd recommend Elixir Nanoweb strings if you're looking to try another brand.

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118328311#Comment_118328311

I did 😀 https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058131091/amati-riva-aquarama-model-boat-1603

Along with some full sized, one is that is still a long story 😪 https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2055963665/classic-wooden-speedboat-build-sink-and-search-for/p1

Thargor

Oh yeah Im well familiar with that thread, every time I see an update on it for the last couple of years I wonder if shes been found. Never knew about the model though you have mad skills with wood.

fergal.b

Being dyslexic I learned very little growing up but now with youtube I seem to be able to learn what ever I like so I try to have a go at any projects that take my eye 😀 I want to learn one song to play for personal reasons on this guitar "tears in heaven " in my heart it was built to play this song for me to express my feelings in a way that I can't with just words. I can't read music and don't know cords maybe it's not even possible for someone with dyslexia to learn to play but I would be interested to know if any of you have, at the moment I am just trying to do it from memory but I am finding it hard to get some fingers to do what I want. I want to learn how it was played and not just something to strum along to. This is what I am learning from.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXysc_HszQ4&t=266s

dmc17

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118329111#Comment_118329111

I've always found Justin Sandercoe's lessons quite good. Tears in Heaven is one of his older videos but worth a look.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yC8W_DGwcU&t=136s&ab_channel=JustinGuitarSongs

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118334467#Comment_118334467

Thanks I like it very clear on where to place my fingers.

biketard

Hi Fergal, as long as you persist, you'll learn that tune. It'll be frustrating at first (and hurt your fingers), but just take it as slow as you need to (even if that seems RIDICULOUSLY slow) and keep practicising it, and it will all come together eventually. You strike me as the type of person who will nail this.

JamesM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118327773#Comment_118327773

See where the strings broke. There could be a sharp edge at the nut or bridge. If it's in the middle, you may have just picked it too hard.

fergal.b

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118339892#Comment_118339892

The first one to break was the thinnest one up at the tuner I think it may have been my fault as when I was putting it on I wrapped it in the wrong direction and then wrapped it the right way that may have weakened it, the other one went when I put my hand in to get the end of the wire probably pushing the other one too far, I guess I was just expecting them to be alot stronger.

Gaspode

That's an amazing job man, beautiful guitar.

I wish I could be that good with carpentry. Cant saw a straight line to save my life!

ctrl-alt-delete

Great job, stumbled upon this thread and remember your boat building one now too.

The guitar looks fantastic - I like the humour in your post too and I hope you manage to get some clamps for Christmas - as you have shown you can never have enough!

p.mc

Lovely job, I've been messing round for ages trying to make guitars, be interested if anyone around kilkenny wants to join in. A bit of collaboration would be good