3/4 inch plywood workboard

hand circle cutter

Dremel router with circle cutting attachment

2 routers and a hand purfling cutter

 This acoustic guitar is going to be made on a plywood workboard with adjustable dowel posts. Any size guitar can be made on this board. The guitar is made upside down. The rosette is inlaid into the top first, the soundhole is then cut out, then the top is turned over and is placed facedown on the workboard.The braces and bridge plate are glued on, then the tailblock and neckblock, then the sides are attached with the kerfing, then the back goes on last. The neck block will have a tenon joint, and this will be bolted to the neck. Special bolts are available from Bunnings hardware, or Stewmac.com. I normally do a dovetail joint, but it requires special jigs and bits. A bolt-on neck is more manageable for a beginner. The hand circle cutter is available from Stewmac, but you have to assemble it yourself. I used mine for at least 25years. It is a great tool. If you can’t get a router, then there is the hand purfling cutter, but be warned, it is very hard going. Of course, you can make your guitar without any binding at all, and it will still look attractive (Takamine comes to mind).

Bandsawing the body shape

Blank joined pieces of hoop pine

                    During the last post, I talked about drawing acoustic guitar shapes.That involved freehand drawing of graceful curves.There is not too much measuring required, namely the lower bout, waist and upper bout. Check out the latest electric guitar shape that I drew from looking at a small picture. It won’t be an exact copy, but it is near enough to look the part. If you learn to make a guitar (electric), you will need to do lots of measuring to get the proportions right. This electric guitar project needed lots of straight line drawing and several opposite edges were either in line or parallel to each other. The key to getting the proportions right was to decide the scale length (string length) of the guitar, and all other measurements of the body had to relate to the fret spacings.

parlour

000 size

dreadnaught

When you learn to make a guitar, you want it to sound good, and you want the shape of it to look good.Guitars of all shapes and colours have been used as a tool to attract attention for some time now. If there is a shape out there that you like, then copy it onto paper or cardboard or plywood. If you would rather have a go at drawing your own shape, then get some drawing paper (newsagents), and begin by drawing a body centerline.The length of this line will basically determine the size of the instrument. You need to mark the upper bout width, waist width, and lower bout width. The parlour guitar is the smallest shown here (photos are not quite to scale), and the dreadnaught is the largest. Once you start drawing freehand, you will soon see how tricky this process is. I was a draftsman for many years, but all my straightline drawing didn’t help much here. You need to draw fluent, elloquent lines.The jumbo guitar size is not shown here, because of the size of the wood needed to make such a guitar. You only need to draw one half of the body, because when you make the wood body template, it is flipped over on its edge to the reverse side to make an identical half.

                          The aim of this blog is to show how to make an acoustic guitar . Before we get into the nuts and bolts of it, we have to look ahead a little , to see what we will need in the way of tools required for the job ahead. It is not my aim to send people broke by investing heavily in big equipment, but rather choose a few indespensible hand tools and outsource parts of the work that requires heavier tools.

                            A solid workbench and a closed in area is a good place to start.My first guitar was made in the tropics, under a house, and I think I could count the number of tools I had on one hand. I had to leave the workbench clean after every time I used it. This first guitar took me a year to make, but it suffered I guess from being moved around so much while still in the construction phase. At that time (‘74),there were no cheap benches around, but now there are $120 ones from hardware stores.You just have to assemble it yourself. These benches are plenty big enough to do guitar work on.

                         The quickest way to make progress on making a guitar would be to purchase all the wood precut to approximate size, and then do the marking out and design. The tools you will most need are:

1. Saws: tenon saw, fretsaw, coping saw, razor saw.

2. Planes: block plane,small hand plane, spokeshave.

3. Scraper blades.

4.Clamps: wooden klempsia cam type, metal long reach ‘g’ clamps, camping pegs.

5. Knives: a selection of hobby knives.

6. Drill bits from 1/16″ to 1/2″, brad point type as well as the normal type.

7. Measuring rulers: 12″ long to 36″ long.

8.Machine square, Vernier caliper.

9. Swivelling vice. (Versa vice, USA)

10. Router, with specialist bits.

11. Sharpening equipment: diamond leveling stones.

Most of these tools are available from local hardware stores and hobby shops, but the specialist luthier tools are available from www.stewmac.com or www.australianluthiersupplies.com or www.guitarwoods.com

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Building a new guitar is a great way to get involved in repairing guitars. It is very difficult to make a guitar from start to finish without making a few slip-ups. For instance, if you are making a neck with a dovtail join to the body, then you will be able to see all the ways of varying the neck alignment. When a guitar comes in to be repaired, you will have prior knowledge of the dovetail join and where exactly you can insert steam nozzles to work the joint loose.Once the neck is separated from the body, you will know where to remove wood to improve the neck angle. Sometimes one can go too far in removing wood and you have to glue on small shims and resize the fit. Wood removal can also go too far when shaping the neck, and the final profile is not what was first intended. While the neck is not necessarily ruined, one gets to appreciate the many neck profiles arrived at by being too gung-ho.

Using a router around the edge of the guitar top or back can cause chipouts, probably because of going against the grain. They can often be repaired, and by doing so, gets you ready for all the damaged guitars that will come by your shop. You will learn to colour match various pieces of wood and you will have in your wood collection, lots of scraps that you can browse through. I keep lots of small offcuts of spruce, cedar, ebony, rosewood etc. Bridge saddle slots often need to be filled in, in preparation for a new slot to be cut just next to it, so I keep the offcuts from edge binding and use them to fill the slot.

Before a new guitar is lacquered, the whole guitar is thoroughly sanded, and this is where little imperfections show up, like pinholes and small gaps between the binding and the top or back. Special wood fillers can be used to plug these gaps, keeping the colour the same as the surrounding wood.After the lacquering is done, occassionally the new guitar has an altercation with the doorway, so there is now a dent in the edge lacquer. Now you have a chance to do the repair and because you’ve done a great job of it, you will easily be able to tackle a lot of the damaged guitars that come your way.

After years of making guitars of all types, classical, steelstring,electric,bass, harp etc, I found that there are many more types of instruments out there that are just as exciting to make. I have just completed a banjo ukelele, made entirely of wood, including the head. The power of this small instrument with nylon strings is amazing.People that hear it for the first time burst out into laughter, not because it is comical, but because it takes them by surprise. This instrument has a scale length of 17″, and my next effort will have a scale length of 18″, only because of my customer’s preference. I used spruce for the soundboard and hoop pine for the body and neck. The fingerboard is ringed gidyee. The strings tie on to small brads in the tail of the neck, and rock maple is the wood used for the bridge. I used banjo style friction machine heads for the tuners.

I have made several all wood banjos with nylon strings. They too are a great tool for a musician to have in their arsenal. They can be useful for having as a practise instrument if their ‘real’ banjo is too loud in certain situations.They are much lighter than their counterparts and are very comfortable to hold. Their quality of sound allows it to hold its own in a small ensemble. A contact pickup in under the soundboard would be a good way to amplify this instrument.

Once you get the bug, it stays with you for life.Doing some skill with your hands provides some inner peace and satisfaction that escapes lots of people. Guitar making can cement your life and give it a direction. There are so many facets to building an instrument, that perhaps you will become an expert in one of the offshoots.For example, you will need to know something about all the woods available in your area as well as offshore.The search for wood of a particular species can take you all over the state, country or globe.The study of wood is a full time occupation on its own, and is a facinating journey.The people you will meet along this road will keep your interest alive.

Another area you will visit many times is that of woodwork machinery. This is another facet which will keep your brain ticking. The scope of woodworking tools is immense, and if you are not careful, it will drain your resources.You will always be thinking, I’ve got to have one of those gizmoes to complete a particular task more efficiently.Sometimes, speed is of the essence, but if your style is more laid back, you will choose the tool that’s right for you.

Once an instrument has been completed and fully sanded, then it should be covered in lacquer, oil or varnish.The application of these finishes is another complete study on its own. There are some entertaining books available on lacquer finishing by people who spent their whole lives doing just that. George Frank is one that comes to mind.

Belonging to a guitar club has been an invaluable asset, both in guitar making and guitar playing. Socializing and networking with peers, has allowed me a certain advantage over competition. For one thing, I get to stay on top of the latest news, techniques, and equipment which keep me up to date and aid me in improving my personal craft guitar making. I also have an opportunity to explore people’s minds and find out what it is that they want in a guitar. I also get to be around some of the other greatest guitar makers in the country so I can see the latest and the greatest things now coming out and at the same time, show others what I have done.

The other thing that has been an extremely important advantage of belonging to guitar club is that I get to network with the exact people from whom I get paid work. Meeting people from all over had helped to advance my business and the knowledge I have gained from these people, has been very important.

One of the better networking situations associated with guitar club memberships are the trade shows that are held. There are always the largest suppliers from across the country attending the show. Getting the opportunity to check out the latest supplies and tools is necessary to keep educating myself on current trends in guitar making. For example, the Brisbane Guitar and Amp show, can draw up to 5,000 people, which gives me a prime opportunity to show my instruments to the right audience.

Since I both work as a guitar maker and enjoy guitar playing, becoming a member of a guitar club just makes sense in every way and I would recommend it to others interested in guitar making and playing.

When making a guitar whether you are making a standard guitar or a custom guitar, there are many considerations to make. Generally, you have to stick to the shapes that are always used. The ways you can deviate from the norm with a handmade guitar is by using more exotic woods and a different range of color not usually seen on guitars you find in a store.

The size and shapes of the guitars will affect their sound. Larger, gloomier sounds will come from a bigger guitar. Smaller-bodies produce sounds that are not as loud. Besides the shape of the guitars, one of the biggest tasks involved in guitar-making is researching and learning the qualities of different woods. I personally use spruce wood for the sound boards. Other popular choices for the sound board are the western red cedar and the red wood from America. Australian wood called hoop pine and the King William pine that comes from Tasmania. Obtaining the wood for your guitar making project can be fairly expensive. Depending on the quality and type of wood used, you can spend around $15 to $100 buying a top.

The tools required to make a guitar are few. Basically, you could make one on your own kitchen table. But a list of general tools needed is as follows: good hand saws, good hand planes, a couple of good, sharpened chisels, little saws to cut fret slots, a miter box to hold your saw and saw the frets, and a band saw. An electric band saw helps to cut the larger pieces of wood and should run a continuous blade saw around two wheels. A router is also essential for cutting the little ledge around the edge of the instrument where you fit the plastic or wood binding.

In addition to the physical supplies needed to make guitars, you also need to have a commitment to doing the work. The process is not week-long. It takes time to do the steps correctly and in the appropriate order. You need to be comfortable and able to work with your hands. Patience is also necessary when making a guitar if you plan to see the project through to the end.