Guitar and ukulele sets (redrawing from scraps by hand)

[Michelle_K]

Hi all
I am new to instrument making and having had a lot of practice and made quite a few mistakes I feel ready to try and make some serious instruments. My question is regarding nice wood sets and namely wood billets. Wood for guitars and ukuleles is very expensive to buy and I wondered if it would be cheaper to buy pieces of wood and cut it up oneself. Which brings me onto my next question, has anyone every cut such wood up by hand. Is it possible. If not are there any wood cutting services that anyone knows of that wood cut wood to such small dimensions.
In my little experience I have come to appreciate pretty woods. Flamed woods and most exotic woods. I have seen now and again off cuts that would be great for ukuleles for example the only trouble being again getting it cut.
Here are the dimensions I am talking about...
For a guitar
Sides are about 11.5cm-12.5cm x 86-89cm x 4-5mm
backs are about 21cm x 55cm x 5mm

And for ukuleles
rough dimensions BACK 380 x 130 x 3-5 mm SIDES 530 x 85 x 3-5mm
I have a Japanese saw that I recently got from lidl I wondered if there was a jig maybe anyone was aware of to resaw such pieces.

I only use hand tools so I know sawing dense woods may take hours but if it will save me money and be a way to access woods that are usually quite expensive in the way of buying offcuts rather then specific sets it would be worth it.

Thank you

Michelle

 

[custard]

I'm not a luthier but I am a furniture maker and frequently cut my own veneers, often from exceptionally figured timbers.

It's risky, and the more figured the wood the riskier it gets.

Once you start handling timber less than about 6mm thick you can find yourself surprised by seemingly random timber movement that pops up out of nowhere. You can reduce the risk by working with quarter sawn, carefully dried, straight grained timber. But often the reason for cutting your own veneer is you want to stretch the yield from spectacularly figured timbers, and even with the boring stuff you frequently get caught out.

I'll live with quite a high level of veneer cutting wastage, but that's when machinery is doing the donkey work. If I was sawing by hand there's no way I'd take the chance. Actually I was cutting some rippled Sycamore veneers last week that didn't work out, when I'm in the workshop tomorrow I'll grab some snaps and post them. If I'd have put hours and hours of gruelling hand work into that job, instead of just minutes at a band saw, I'd probably still be sobbing and inconsolable right now!

 

[Kalimna]

I would suggest that, until you have a good understanding of the properties generally required by guitar/uke building of the timbers used, you bite the bullet and buy wood that has been sifted through and selected by someone who knows what they are doing.
Ive bandsawn then thickness sanded some rippled maple for ukulele back and sides. It worked, and i have some laburnum and hornbeam i plan to do simillar with. But i certainly wouldnt do it by hand.
You dont need to spend big bucks on master-grade tonewoods to make a fine sounding instrument (see Bob Benedetto's knotty pine archtop or Bob Taylors simillar flattop), but it is definitely worth the minimal outlay (compared to the project as a whole) to buy wood intended as luthiery wood.
Having said all that, if you have some wood you would like to use, go ahead and give it a try - it may sound great and will definitely be a good learning experience.

Cheers,
Adam

 

[JohnPW]

Regarding not hand sawing, is that because of the physical effort (actually not that hard work) needed or is it that it needs a lot of skill so it's easy to make a mistake? Or maybe it just takes longer.

I wouldn't class using a sawing guide or a jig as sawing by hand, just my opinion.

 

[Michelle_K]

I recently attempted to cut a slice off of a piece of sapele and it took me over an hour and a half. I found it hard but maybe it's because I am not that strong. I guess I'll just buy some sets. Was just looking for another way. Thanks everyone.

 

[Benchwayze]

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gibson-Byrdla ... SwU9xUS9KR

I know this isn't a 'Uke', but just look at the grain, on the back of this Gibson...

I am trying to resist buying this guitar, and it's getting more and more difficult to do so! 8)

 

[Michelle_K]

Wow that figure! Gee! That's beautiful.

 

[bugbear]

To re-state something custard has said before, the cost of materials, compared to your time, on such a project is very low, and has a large impact on the eventual quality of the result. If you can in any way afford "the good stuff", buy it.

I will point out that in a hollow body instrument, like an acoustic guitar, mandolin or uke, the sides need to bend, and the top needs to be thin and resonant, This (pretty much) precludes anything but uniform straight grained timbers - no flames!

If ya' want to go super pretty, make a solid body electric, and go crazy on the top.

http://www.asdhawaii.com/whats_new.htm

That one's a single piece of wood, but if you stick with a flat top, a single (low cost) sheet of exotic veneer would give you mega BLING for not much outlay.

Edit; whilst searching I found this which is topic drift, but a lot of fun

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQeoqqnwVQ4

BugBear

 

[Benchwayze]

Wow that figure! Gee! That's beautiful.

Yes it is indeed. If I sell a few power tools I might be able to fund the purchase. The 'short scale-length' would suit me fine.

I think the figure is known as 'Quilted Maple' BTW.

Regards

John

 

[custard]

Here's a Rippled Sycamore veneer I cut at 2.7mm for stringing lines. It decided to misbehave! No problems, picked a different board and cut another which worked fine. But if I had spent hours with a hand saw I'd have been feeling pretty sick. Follow Bugbear's advice, forget hand sawing your own components and buy a kit, in terms of the hours making the instrument versus the price of the kit it has to be both a bargain and by far the most cost effective solution.

 

[NazNomad]

I recently attempted to cut a slice off of a piece of sapele and it took me over an hour and a half.

The key to great Luthiery is ... 'what's the rush?' :lol:

BTW, the way they HAVEN'T lined up the quilted Maple on the back of that Gibson is playing havoc with my OCD.

 

[Benchwayze]

BTW, the way they HAVEN'T lined up the quilted Maple on the back of that Gibson is playing havoc with my OCD.

Naz,

I think that's because it isn't an exact book-match. If you look it over you can see the grain doesn't repeat on both sides; probably two separate pieces matched as best possible; although they could have done a better job of lining up; but then I don't have OCD, thankfully.

Either way, I still want to buy that guitar!


Cheers
John

 

[profchris]

I've cut the majority of the wood for my ukes by hand - it's a slow business but works surprisingly well if (a) you take it slowly, and (b) you have a decent enough saw (more on that later).

However, the financial saving is not that great unless you enjoy the exercise and so don't make a notional charge for your time. I like to salvage wood (I got a lot of ukes out of one wardrobe), and also like the ability to select the wood myself. As an example, I found this figured oak inside a length of bar top:

I doubt anyone sells this sort of thing as tonewood.

Buying your wood saves a lot of effort, but only if you buy it from a good supplier. Much of the stuff advertised as "tonewood" on eBay is chosen for looks, rather than usability. David ****, Touchstone Tonewoods, Rob Collins of tinguitar.com, Stuart Longridge would be my choices (there are probably a couple of others in the UK, but not many).

For a mahogany uke you can do surprisingly well using 1.5mm or 2mm panels purchased from a model making shop if you select them well. As in this one:

(the panels are clearly sapele, but sold as mahogany).

The important factors in choosing, if buying from a model making shop or cutting yourself, are:

(a) vertical grain ( ||||||||||||||||||| viewed from the end). Quarter sawn might mean this, or might refer to the cutting of the wood (in which case some boards will have grain at an angle). Perfectly vertical grain is hard to find, but get close. This is important for top and back, to reduce the cross-grain movement with humidity and thus the chance of cracking. Sides with vertical grain are more likely to bend evenly and not cup.

(b) plain, straight grain for the sides, as figured grain is challenging to bend. Save that for later (if ever). For tops and backs figured wood looks nice, but is harder to thickness without tearout and might not sound quite as good. But curly/figured wood can sound good as well as look good - I was happy with both aspects of this one (which is only 170mm/6.57inch scale length!):

If you decide to cut your own wood you do need a solid bench and vice. I've hand sawn using a workmate-type affair, and the flex uses up half the effort as waste. The principle is simple:

(a) Plane one face flat.

(b) Mark a line all round using the planed face as the reference surface. For first attempts I'd mark at 4mm or 5mm, but I can now achieve uke body plates by marking at 3mm.

(c) Saw a kerf all round along the lines - careful use of a tenon saw can achieve this.

(d) Start the main cutting at one corner. One you're an inch or so down the side, reverse the wood and cut the opposite corner. Keep on like this until you reach the other end of the plank. If you go slow, your saw will remain within the kerfs you cut.

I originally did this with an ordinary disposable panel saw - it's OK, but cuts slowly and tends to wander if you force it at all. I now have a car boot 26inch saw which I've filed rip at about 5 tpi, and that tracks better and cuts faster. Still a slow job. Japanese pull saws can do the job too, but might be very slow unless they're rip saws.

If you want to start off on the cheap, go to a model making shop and look at their mahogany panels (3ft x 3 ins or 3ft x 4 inches). One panel will make top and back for a uke, a second the sides.

I wouldn't even consider cutting guitar top and sides by hand - the panels are just too big.

Or invest in wood from a good supplier and concentrate on the building.

Good luck!

 

[bugbear]

I wouldn't even consider cutting guitar top and sides by hand - the panels are just too big.

It hadn't occurred to me (until you pointed it out) that Uke panels (ditto for mandolin?) are small enough to reduced the skill/work/difficulty of hand re-sawing. Very Good Point.

For creating your initial circumferential kerf, There's a gadget being promoted by one Tom Fidgen (he claims to have invented in, but "Prior Art" has been found) called a "Kerfing Plane".

It's (in effect) a fenced segment of saw blade, like a stair saw and a plough plane had a wild night of romance.

A fixed offset one (more related to a drawer bottom plane than a plough plane) can be bodged together really easily.

BugBear

 

[custard]

I think that's because it isn't an exact book-match. If you look it over you can see the grain doesn't repeat on both sides; probably two separate pieces matched as best possible; although they could have done a better job of lining up

It's a book match all right and it's a reasonably exact one, no book match using saw cut veneers is ever totally perfect because of the loss of material from the kerf, but that's about as good as you'll ever get with quilted maple.

I always keep a few big thick boards of heavily quilted maple in stock, such as these,

I do offer them to furniture clients, but suggest they're only used as accent pieces, and I advise against book matching for exactly this reason. The holographic or chatoyance effect of the polished timber means, instead of a pleasing symmetry, a book match just results in a glaring, jarring, unharmonious joint line. Well, that's my opinion at least, but as I spend most of my day working with highly figured timbers it's an opinion that's maybe worth a hearing at least.

You can get away with book matching high chatoyance timbers, but only if the figure is tight and spidery (as with Rippled Sycamore or Fiddleback Maple) rather than wide and splodgy (as with Quilted Maple). In fact that's why "fiddleback" is called "fiddleback", because the received aesthetic wisdom from generations of craftsmen is that this is something that actually works as a book match for a musical instrument! Here's some Fiddleback Maple that I managed to source as long, wide boards and it did indeed end up becoming book matched furniture.

Rippled Sycamore is almost as impactful as Fiddleback Maple, as well as being much easier to source as solid timber boards in the UK, which is why it's so widely used at the moment, often being paired up with Black Walnut which seems to compliments it well.

So, my advice would be save your money, because to my eye that guitar looks about as elegant as one of Saddam Hussein's gold plated toilets!

Good luck!

 

[bugbear]

So, my advice would be save your money, because to my eye that guitar looks about as elegant as one of Saddam Hussein's gold plated toilets!

See also the recent thread on Zebrano...

Tastes vary, one of the joys of being Human.

Even "classic" furniture wasn't as muted and "tasteful" as some would have you believe.

http://secretlivesofobjects.blogspot.co ... earch.html

BugBear

 

[custard]

Tastes vary, one of the joys of being Human.

Couldn't agree more, it's everyone's right to have a gold plated toilet if they so wish.

 

[bugbear]

Tastes vary, one of the joys of being Human.

Couldn't agree more, it's everyone's right to have a gold plated toilet if they so wish.

If nothing else, it keeps the gold plated toilet makers in a job. :lol:

BugBear

 

[Benchwayze]

Having never worked with Quilted Maple I bow to your superior knowledge on that one Custard. I suppose you're saying it's a bit ostentatious.

Well if I buy it, it would be because of what it is; a short-scale; Gibson Byrdland. (It's not far from me fortunately, and I might even know the seller). So I'd only buy, after I've seen, and played it. The fact I also like the back, is a bonus.

The reason I might buy this guitar is I turned down a chance to buy a 'Tobacco Sunburst' example some thirty years ago; simply because I flipped a coin and went for something else. It is likely to increase in value, so Number One Son will appreciate it too; one day.

I do think the back looks beautiful; but in any case, it will spend most of its time unseen, against my ample torso, but man... it would sound fantastic; as long as you like Jazz that is! (Which some folk think is ostentatious too!) :lol: :lol: :lol:

Cheers

John

 

[profchris]

I wouldn't even consider cutting guitar top and sides by hand - the panels are just too big.

For creating your initial circumferential kerf, There's a gadget being promoted by one Tom Fidgen (he claims to have invented in, but "Prior Art" has been found) called a "Kerfing Plane".

It's (in effect) a fenced segment of saw blade, like a stair saw and a plough plane had a wild night of romance.

A fixed offset one (more related to a drawer bottom plane than a plough plane) can be bodged together really easily

Indeed a useful gadget! I probably ought to make one, but I only resaw a dozen or so ukulele sets a year so I haven't bothered yet.

My friend Sven in Stockholm has bothered though, and Michelle might find his blog posts about resawing useful (especially the pictures showing how he clamps the board and approaches the cutting). He uses both a rip saw and a home-made frame saw. Most of the relevant posts are via this link, though in a somewhat random order as the search function found them.

http://argapa.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=kerfing+plane