Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

Matt_W wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 05, 2025 6:57 pm

Ive heard a rule of thumb "A year per inch thick, plus a year" for wood seasoning, so a 2.5mm top is about 10 weeks? Hopefully i don't have to leave it that long before glueing up

Think that rule would apply for green wood.

I reckon most of the bad workshop fires involve paint thinners.

TomBicknell wrote: ↑

Thu Jul 03, 2025 8:06 pm

Good point about the insurance, Nigel. There’s a number of fire resistant panels on the market, thankfully.

The issue here is cheap mainly Chinese made SIPs that don't meet the building code as far as inflammability rating of materials used in the SIPs. Of particular concern are panels with inflammable skins as well as internal insulating styrene that doesn't have a fire inhibitor added. Prior to construc...

Its my understanding that an instrument drying out is generally worse than having it take on a bit of moisture. For that reason you try and build at a RH that is lower than that of the final destination of the instrument. 30-40% was always my target humidity here in The Adelaide Hills. As I understa...

The cheapest and simplest dry box I ever saw was a cardboard box with an incandesant light bulb. Heat from the bulb was enough to keep the humidity at a reasonably low level.

The problem of course is finding an incandesant light bub these days.

Anyone with the balls to post up warts and all photos of his very first gets my full respect.

You're doing fine for a first build.....looking good.

I want to build it out of insulated panels - think what coolrooms are built of. The basic version is two sheets of Colorbond with 50mm of polystyrene between them for insulation, but you can get versions with PIR foam, which dramatically improves the insulation. They're self-supporting so you don't...

We're using the word "shed"......a term that conjures up images of cobwebs, dust and piles of stuff you should have thrown away years ago.

Workshop is a better term....

Wayne writes up a detailed plan complete with full scale drawings before eating breakfast each morning

Love the attention to detail.

Looking good mate. Nice score with that Stanley plane.

If humidity is an issue then you have a choice of controlling same in the whole shed....or isolating a small part of the shed (ie a cupboard) for humidity control at critical stages of guitar construction. I obsessed a bit about humidity here in The Adelaide Hills and started off with a dehumidifer ...

Had to do a double take there. Thought the thread title read "jockstraps" .

lamanoditrento wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 01, 2025 4:30 pm

Although I do normally know the pallet of woods I want to use.

Pallet loads of tonewood.......LOL

Nice work Wayne....a unique looking instrument with a lot of "personality".

Alan McFarlen will know.

malcolmw wrote: ↑

Sat Jun 21, 2025 11:22 am

Will have to see if i can borrow it from the BGMS library. There are a few things to decide, including soudhole size and back stiffness - lots of fun!

I have a first edition of The Books up for sale on Buy and Sell.

That's what happens when you let WAS get out of control.

Nick wrote: ↑

Wed Jun 18, 2025 9:25 am

Go west young man (West of NZ that is)

I think most of New Zealand is already over here in Oz..last one to leave please turn out the lights

Okay...I ended up using Pack n Save (Unley, Adelaide franchise) to freight 600kg of tonewood from Adelaide to Brisbane. The franchise is run by two lovely Iraquis..Rez and Azadeh. Rez dropped by with a van and picked up 38 cartons and took care of palletizing them before shipment to Brisbane. The wo...

Australia is a massive country.....you first need to key in your entry and exit points. Further planning would revolve around the latter.

Fit Indian Rosewood cladding and then go in with a pumice pore fill and french polish!!

Thanks Nigel. I love professional luthiers who openly share insights into their working day.

During my recent new house build my house designer vetoed my suggestion we go for Gore style laminated falcate roof trusses

malcolmw wrote: ↑

Tue Jun 10, 2025 5:59 pm

Isn't that wonderful! Though, my wife says no using the design for the house extension.

malcolmw wrote: ↑

Mon Jun 09, 2025 5:39 pm

I plan to build the back fairly lively to see how that contributes to the tone.

Be careful with a live back. Suggest you read up Gore and Gilet for advice on tuning of back frequency.

Over the last few weeks I have had to delete a number of posts in which relatively new members are spruiking their businesses/products. While we are open to members advertising their businesses via this forum we insist that people consult with forum admins prior to doing so. Permission will be grant...