Luthier workshop set up ?

[Trigs]

Hi guys and gals,

Almost finished my new workshop after 10 years thinking about it ( I'll get some pics up when I get home) and plan to start building guitars as a hobby. Just wondered if there's any luthiers on here who could offer advice on tools both power and hand (especially specific luthier tools. I have a fair collection of general hand/power tools already as I used to work as a joiner but knocked it on the head to play and teach guitar for a living.

Was thinking of the Axminster AW10BSB with extensions/slide or Charnwood w650 and possibly the TS 200 if I decide to save some ££ though I don't want to scrimp I've always said it takes a rich man to buy cheap and I'm not sure I have the patience to wait for a single phase wadkin to come up

And the AW106 planer thicknesser

Haven't a clue on bandsaws and sanders so suggestions would be most helpful. First job though will be to finish my elm coffee table

Cheers

 

[MIGNAL]

I make Guitars and the odd instrument that isn't a Guitar. I have a small bandsaw, that's about it for the power tools. Even that bandsaw isn't used a great deal. You can get away with hardly any specialist tools, in fact you could quite easily get along without any of them.

 

[Trigs]

Hi mignal, do you make all guitars or specialise in one or the other ? My plan was to start with electric but classicl is what I really fancy

 

[MIGNAL]

I go from about 1580 to 1890. Then I stop. Things started to get sht after that, save for the odd electric archtop.

 

[Sporky McGuffin]

I've built a handlful of electrics, and I have to agree that the bandsaw is pretty much the only bit of machinery you need. A router is almost essential for electrics, and if you've got that you can build a thicknessing jig so no need for a big expensive planer thicknesser (and you have to go huge to get a guitar body through).

If you were anywhere near Surrey you could have my old thicknessing jig for nowt.

 

[Trigs]

I go from about 1580 to 1890. Then I stop. Things started to get sht after that, save for the odd electric archtop.

Ah lutes/parlour gtrs then, I spent many hrs cutting my teeth learning pieces between those years

Ha ha cheers Sporky I made one a while ago, the p/t is a luxury I know but no doubt I'll decide to build something other than a guitar that will be a lot easier with one... I'd rather turn up to a knife fight with 2 guns

 

[MIGNAL]

Guitars rather than Lutes. Right through to the modern Classical, which probably starts at Torres.
Your planar/thicknesser would be virtually redundant in making acoustic Guitars. The only reason to use a thickness sander is if you are making one every two weeks. Let me tell you, there aren't very many individual Guitar makers making much more than one per month, and yes I'm referring to the professionals. Believe me, it's a very, very, very crowded market. Thicknessing can be done with a couple of hand planes. There's a particular method to get very fast at that too. It's all well and good shelling out for all the power tool gear but if it's getting seriously under used it may as well not exist in the first place.

 

[niagra]

I'm building my first guitar at the moment - electric neck through bass and am attempting to do it all with no power tools. No problems so far, including thicknessing, truss rod slot, control cavities, fret slots, shaping the body and sawing the neck for laminating. My next tricky job is rebating for the binding. I'd say have a go with what you've got and just buy if absolutely essential.

 

[Sporky McGuffin]

Ha ha cheers Sporky I made one a while ago, the p/t is a luxury I know but no doubt I'll decide to build something other than a guitar that will be a lot easier with one... I'd rather turn up to a knife fight with 2 guns

Having a p/t certainly opens up a lot of possibilities.

 

[Kalimna]

Having built a couple of electrics and ukes, I would suggest that, for hobby work, a bandsaw and router are, if not essential, then certainly desirable.
Of course everything can be done by hand - but powered (especially cutting the pickup, control and neck pockets for an electric) does make life easier and perhaps more repeatable if you don't have a mentor guiding your every hand move. I do have a p/t and table saw, but have never used it for luthiery.
It must also be said that apart from being quieter, cheaper and less dusty, using hand tools means that any mistakes take longer to happen, and easier to correct. It doesn't take long for a router to slip in a moment of inattention, and ruin a binding channel or truss rod slot.

Cheers,
Adam.

P.s if you are ever down near Stirling, you are welcome to see my set-up, and do a little thicknessing of sides/tops/backs on my thickness sander.

 

[MIGNAL]

Thicknessing acoustic Guitar Backs, Sides and Tops came up on one of the luthier forums a few months ago. I was staggered to read pro luthiers stating that it takes either all day! (they were being serious) or 4 or 5 hours to thickness a Back and side set.
It's quite obvious what was going on. Sometime in their distant past they had tried a hand plane, no doubt the blade a little dull. They obviously had no idea of what a true Jack plane does and they probably had no idea of planing across the grain. They were probably using relatively heavy metal planes. Mix all that in with Rosewood and it turned into an exercise of sweat, great effort and frustration. They just gave in and went out and bought a thickness sander.
I don't have a problem with that. It's the spreading of the myth regarding hand Planes that I take exception to. These Backs/Sides aren't the size of a dining room table, they are less that 2 ft in length by not much above 12" in width. You are only going from some 5.5 mm's down to 2.5 mm's. When I stated that I could plane a Rosewood Back to thickness in around 15 minutes I'm almost certain that they thought I was lying. I've got news for them. If it's Walnut I can do it in under 12 minutes, start to finish. Blade sharpening excluded.
It's all in the Plane type, set up and method.

 

[Trigs]

Sounds like I have the tools needed, just need to get my hand dusty and learn from mistakes that will inevitably be made.

 

[profchris]

Thicknessing acoustic Guitar Backs, Sides and Tops came up on one of the luthier forums a few months ago. I was staggered to read pro luthiers stating that it takes either all day! (they were being serious) or 4 or 5 hours to thickness a Back and side set.
It's quite obvious what was going on. Sometime in their distant past they had tried a hand plane, no doubt the blade a little dull. They obviously had no idea of what a true Jack plane does and they probably had no idea of planing across the grain. They were probably using relatively heavy metal planes. Mix all that in with Rosewood and it turned into an exercise of sweat, great effort and frustration. They just gave in and went out and bought a thickness sander.
I don't have a problem with that. It's the spreading of the myth regarding hand Planes that I take exception to. These Backs/Sides aren't the size of a dining room table, they are less that 2 ft in length by not much above 12" in width. You are only going from some 5.5 mm's down to 2.5 mm's. When I stated that I could plane a Rosewood Back to thickness in around 15 minutes I'm almost certain that they thought I was lying. I've got news for them. If it's Walnut I can do it in under 12 minutes, start to finish. Blade sharpening excluded.
It's all in the Plane type, set up and method.

I'm not that quick, but that's because I'm not very good at sharpening. When I do achieve sharp, planing is very quick and not hard work.

Planing at 45 degrees or so is magic (with a sharp blade) - the only risk I find is splitting off bits of the far side of the plate you're working on. If you stick the plate to a board (masking tape and superglue trick) then this problem goes away if you stick down under the edges of the plate.

For anyone who wants to try this, sharpening the moment wood stops slicing off easily is the key. Don't think "Just one more pass ..."

 

[thick_mike]

Thicknessing acoustic Guitar Backs, Sides and Tops came up on one of the luthier forums a few months ago. I was staggered to read pro luthiers stating that it takes either all day! (they were being serious) or 4 or 5 hours to thickness a Back and side set.
It's quite obvious what was going on. Sometime in their distant past they had tried a hand plane, no doubt the blade a little dull. They obviously had no idea of what a true Jack plane does and they probably had no idea of planing across the grain. They were probably using relatively heavy metal planes. Mix all that in with Rosewood and it turned into an exercise of sweat, great effort and frustration. They just gave in and went out and bought a thickness sander.
I don't have a problem with that. It's the spreading of the myth regarding hand Planes that I take exception to. These Backs/Sides aren't the size of a dining room table, they are less that 2 ft in length by not much above 12" in width. You are only going from some 5.5 mm's down to 2.5 mm's. When I stated that I could plane a Rosewood Back to thickness in around 15 minutes I'm almost certain that they thought I was lying. I've got news for them. If it's Walnut I can do it in under 12 minutes, start to finish. Blade sharpening excluded.
It's all in the Plane type, set up and method.

I'm not that quick, but that's because I'm not very good at sharpening. When I do achieve sharp, planing is very quick and not hard work.

Planing at 45 degrees or so is magic (with a sharp blade) - the only risk I find is splitting off bits of the far side of the plate you're working on. If you stick the plate to a board (masking tape and superglue trick) then this problem goes away if you stick down under the edges of the plate.

For anyone who wants to try this, sharpening the moment wood stops slicing off easily is the key. Don't think "Just one more pass ..."

What is the masking tape and superglue trick?

I am imagining it, but I'm not sure if I've got it right in my mind.

 

[JohnPW]

I make Guitars and the odd instrument that isn't a Guitar. I have a small bandsaw, that's about it for the power tools. Even that bandsaw isn't used a great deal. You can get away with hardly any specialist tools, in fact you could quite easily get along without any of them.

Aren't there a few specialist tools that you do need or are very useful, like a bending iron (for bending ribs) or a thickness gauge (for archtop instruments)? They could be home made of course.

 

[MIGNAL]

A lot of the time I don't even Plane at 45 but straight across. Whatever the wood tells you. There are a few factors that slow things down. One is the clamping issue. Continually clamping and removing those clamps to measure thickness eats up time. Not only that but if you are using the method of clamping at one end and planing away, it's twice as bad.
The solution that I came up with was to make a holder. It's basically a piece of 18 mm plywood that fastens in the vice. I have several of these. The one for the sides is . . . . well, side shaped. The side is contained by strips of wood glued all around the 4 edges, it's thickness just under your typical side thickness. The one for the Back is similar, except that it's Back (or Top) shaped. Cutting out the Back to shape prior to thicknessing also means you are really removing only the wood that needs to be removed. In it's square format you are wasting some effort.
For this to work you need the 'right' type of plane. It has to be reasonably long (near 14" Jack sized). That helps to keep the wood flat down to the planing holder. Even with the Sides you plane across the grain, never with it. Forget metal Planes, they are too heavy and cumbersome. They tire you out. A metal smoother may be OK for the last few swipes though. It's the wooden Jack that does the brunt work. It needs to be a cambered blade, extremely sharp, chipbreaker retracted. Heavy shaving. I sometimes refer to it as a 'gentle scrub plane' but really it's one of the true uses of a Jack. The lighter wooden plane means you can plane very fast for longer. Believe me, I've put all of this through the test but at the end of the day it's all pretty logical when you think about it.

 

[MIGNAL]

I make Guitars and the odd instrument that isn't a Guitar. I have a small bandsaw, that's about it for the power tools. Even that bandsaw isn't used a great deal. You can get away with hardly any specialist tools, in fact you could quite easily get along without any of them.

Aren't there a few specialist tools that you do need or are very useful, like a bending iron (for bending ribs) or a thickness gauge (for archtop instruments)? They could be home made of course.

Years ago I made a wooden former and had one cast in solid aluminium. I still use it. Prior to that I just used a blow torch and a metal (I think it was brass) pipe.
Many make their own homemade thickness gauge, using a dial caliper. My friend (who makes Violins) doesn't use one, even though he has a very expensive model. He uses the gauge that Strad supposedly used, puts a little indentation in the wood. Bit like using a pillar drill to indicate depth. There's probably many ingenious and cheap ways.

 

[Trigs]

I make Guitars and the odd instrument that isn't a Guitar. I have a small bandsaw, that's about it for the power tools. Even that bandsaw isn't used a great deal. You can get away with hardly any specialist tools, in fact you could quite easily get along without any of them.

Aren't there a few specialist tools that you do need or are very useful, like a bending iron (for bending ribs) or a thickness gauge (for archtop instruments)? They could be home made of course.

Plus fretting tools and sanding blocks to profile the fingerboard radious.

I'm sure it's like any woodworking in that experience and your particular strengths / weaknesses will determine how you tackle different tasks. I think I'll try mignals a planing idea when I come to do a classical

 

[iNewbie]

What is the masking tape and superglue trick?

I am imagining it, but I'm not sure if I've got it right in my mind.

Here's a short version - you'll find a ton of guitar videos from this guy on YT. His previous was a tad long on the subject!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fiwc5yGHn4

 

[profchris]

The masking tape/superglue trick is simpler than Mignal's setup, though less elegant. Use it to stick two flat objects together firmly but temporarily. Eg, for thinning plates:

Get a flat baseboard bigger then the plate. Stick lengths of beige masking tape along either side of the face of your plate which will be downwards. Stick matching lengths to the baseboard, but a bit longer than the plate. Apply thin line of superglue along tape, press together, et voilà. You can clamp the baseboard and plane away unhindered. To remove, prise up tape from baseboard, when plate is free, remove from plate.

For building acoustic instruments you want more clamps than you could possibly imagine!

I bend sides on a hot pipe (from an old trailer jockey wheel) heated with a cheap heat gun.