The Scroll Shop (Ed of H's Shop Thread)

[edwardofhuncote]

Another milestone today... pre-retirement meeting with HR this morning. They crunched the numbers and put them in front of me. Dispensation, insurance, deductions, scheduling... man... it's a reality check. Doesn't seem like much for 30-some-odd years of whatever. But it's on. I'm out this Fall. And this dusty workshop will be my #1 gig from there forward.

[pauldo]

Congratulations.   

[edwardofhuncote]

I've hopscotched around on several projects this weekend.

I finished up the Yamaha acoustic-electric that had loose braces and the bridge lift. I had to put in some overtime on it to get it right though. That bridge would never have come offa' that guitar in 100 years, whatever that goop is they epoxy them on with is freakin' amazing... but it had been lifted for long enough that it was warped. I thought I'd get away with wicking some glue underneath it and clamping the daylights out of it with some well-placed cauls. It worked until I put it under string tension annnnd.... *tink*. Oh well, break out the heat lamp and spatula. After it finally came off, I chiseled all the finish and glue off down to wood. I flattened the bottom of the bridge on the belt sander and took a little height too, bought me a little more room for setup on the action. Skipping ahead, it set up really nice. Even those stock electronics nearly 30 years old crackled to life with a new battery. I'll send this one out to my buddy Joey, who favors these Yammyhaw geetars. He's probably wore out the tires on his flower truck this weekend. This one goes back to the store tomorrow, and the youngster who will be playing it should have it by tomorrow evening. Son of the original owner.

Took this early 1890's John Buckbee banjo in for a new head, strings, and setup. It's really a pleasure to work on such a nice old instrument like this. You just don't get to see many this well-preserved. I've got it all tore down and cleaned up. I'll order a new head tomorrow... 11-1/16", high crown. That's a weird one. The most interesting thing here; that tonering. It's just a rolled steel ring, maybe 5/16" diameter stock, but the way it rides on top of a ring of steel rivets, each positioned directly over a corresponding bracket-shoe. Fascinating. I have seen similar ideas, but never exactly this. I did something like it once, on a tenor banjo for a friend. Mine had a rolled brass hoop tonering, 1/4" stock, and I made it float on top of brass screws in the top of a wood shell. I arrived at the idea independently... clearly it already existed a century before.


Time to rest my brains for another week of Waterworks madness.

[cozmik_cowboy]

Diggin' the mirrored inlays around the nut on that banjer!

Peter

[edwardofhuncote]

Diggin' the mirrored inlays around the nut on that banjer!

Peter

Pretty cool, ain't it? That was a particular style of the time. A few notable builders did that back then... a first fret inlay would be replicated in mirror-image just above the nut. I had that in mind when designing the truss rod cover for #28. Just a little wink at the past.

[David Houck]

The guitar looks nice.

[edwardofhuncote]

High-pressure job in the shop this week... a classic C.F. Martin & Co. repair work, remove and reglue the bridge from a late 90's/early 2000's HD-28.

See, there was a timeframe where Martin didn't have their top jig set up to remove the finish from the entire footprint where the bridge needs to sit. The result is, a poor wood-to-wood glue joint, practically every guitar like this was doomed to allow the bridge to lift. I almost ducked this one, because the guitar had scarcely a scratch on it. It belongs to the brother of an old friend though, so I took the job, and waited for a  good calm day to fire up the heatlamp and made sure the seam knife was really clean. I taped that top up to hell and gone, lest I slip and turn one little job into a great big one. I got some water/vinegar handy. Two hours later, the bridge was off, clean. Nary a sliver of spruce top came with it, just one little splinter run in the ebony I'd need to glue.

You can see the failure here. Now I'm as big of a Martin fan-dude as there is, but this is just so silly. There is nearly a 1/4" border of lacquer under the bridge footprint here. In the next picture, I have scribed it, and trimmed it away with a sharp blade, and cleaned the old glue off, prepped for the reglue. The bridge is ready too.

Annnnd.... clamped back on, using my bridge jig. I'll knock these clamps off tomorrow and set the guitar back up. Breathe out...

*The new head should be in for the Buckbee banjo tomorrow. It was a weird size. Had to special-order.

[edwardofhuncote]

[sigh]

Thought I was done with the HD-28. Nope. I was stringing it up, looked inside with my inspection mirror to make sure the string ball-ends seated correctly against the bridgeplate... and noticed a tiny crack in the X-brace forming right at the cross. No idea how. It may have been like this for years. There's not a mark on this guitar from any impact. Makes no diff... I had to fix that. One little squeeze of glue, a wet wipe to clean up the excess, clamp between cauls, and another overnight on the bench.

Oh well... it ain't like I gotta' feed it breakfast.

*the oddball-sized banjo head came in today, so I'll probably jump back on that tomorrow evening.

[David Houck]

Nice work!

[edwardofhuncote]

The HD-28's owner picked his guitar up today and was so tickled with the setup they paid me, tipped me, ran back home and brought me their HD-35 to work on. It just needs the action tweaked. Karma?

I tried the banjo head. It fitn' dit. I ordered another, 11-1/8" Dia. Ya' win some, ya' choke on a few. Some days it's all gutter-balls.


In the meantime, I am reassembling a Kay bass that I haven't posted about. It's been a long, protracted job. Could have been its own epic thread... it's literally strewn around my shop in three major pieces, and a few other incidentals. Right now, I'm fitting the dovetail neck joint back together after shimming it.

[edwardofhuncote]

Fitting the dovetail...

I have made an improvised tool to reach inside the dovetail block and sand the shimmed gluing surfaces. I'm also sanding the corresponding surfaces of the neck. This is tedious and time-consuming. I use a piece of chalk to mark these surfaces so I can tell where the contact is being made... slowly but surely, the joint slides together and gets tighter.

Almost there... but the dovetail is not quite seated into the block yet. This last 3/8" is critical.  If I have overshot, then more shims get glued in, and the process starts over.

Once I am close enough with the dry-fit, I'll lay the neck aside and glue the repaired top back onto the body. It will never win a beauty contest, but C-1 #13766 will be structurally solid.

(did I mention this one was a mess?)

[cozmik_cowboy]

Man, and I was impressed with myself when I managed to make and install a new harness in my Epiphone Sheraton (what a 335 wishes it was); you, Sir, have skills!

Peter

[peoplechipper]

I love when improvised tools work out; one time I made a tool to remove wood from around the end of a Fender truss rod to get more threads so I wouldn't have to trash the neck (a lotta threads were beat) and in a goldsmithing example I found, even with having nearly 200 different metal files, I didn't have one for the job; I wound up using string rubbed in polishing compound to do the job...if anyone's interested, I was making a copy of a Tiffany 'bubbles' ring with diamonds and rubies, so you can see the difficulties of making it...I'd post a pic, but I only have film pics of the ring (before I got a digital camera)...Tony.

[cozmik_cowboy]

That's cool, Tony (both parts) - and now Stew-Mac sells a tool (for _a lot_ more than yours cost......) just for hogging wood out so one can use the included die to cut more threads.

Peter

[David Houck]

... I have made an improvised tool to reach inside the dovetail block and sand the shimmed gluing surfaces. I'm also sanding the corresponding surfaces of the neck. This is tedious and time-consuming ...

Careful you don't bang up your fingers.