Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

Gaby (and others), we (D-TAR) don't have a packaged, ready to go uke unit. I modify our Timberline system by disconnecting the battery/voltage booster pack from the preamp, putting a jumper from the battery positive input to the preamp over to a solder pad on the PC card that connects to the output ...

You ought to see the massive hydraulic press at Gibson...the ram must be 24" in diameter.

That guitar sounds very open and airy...

For maximum "pop", try epoxy sealing first. It's not just good on open pored woods. Do wash and sand before top coating to get rid of any amine blush issues. If you don't mind trading off chatoyance for a bit more obvious grain highlighting, you could use a water stain in amber or brown first, allow...

One other point...when you say "butt joint", what comes immediately to mind is an end grain to end grain glue joint...about the weakest you can do. I do understand from the context of what you're writing that you intend to glue long grain to long grain...and the advice is good...if it's a good joint...

As promised: Glues I use in lutherie, where I use them, and a bit about why. Hot hide glue Center seams for tops and backs Gluing braces to tops and backs Bridges on acoustic instruments Kerfing for acoustic guitars Tops to sides on acoustic guitars Traditional, and still a favorite for many lutheri...

Apparently there have been issues in the past with the LMI stuff...a bad batch or a batch that got frozen or something like that, but we've put literally hundreds of guitars together using the LMI glue in a lot of the joints including peghead scarfs which are about the toughest joints to get really ...

Tim's tests pretty much confirm what many of us know from a more empirical perspective. There is still nothing about how vibrations are carried through and across glue joints. Tests on that factor could be conducted using a Lucchi Elasticity Tester, but I don't have one. That would be interesting, t...

Dennis, I'll write up my list of glues and uses over the weekend, but here's a question for you. Why on earth would you use Titebond Original when there's another glue...LMI white glue...that is just as convenient to use as Titebond and which, from all we can gather, has significantly lower cold cre...

I'm merely asking questions, not shoving some concept of the truth down anyone's throat. As for me, I choose not to use rubbery glues for building instruments. I don't have any issues building as I do, so for me, Titebond 3 is a solution looking for a problem. Hey, in spite of the evidence that orig...

David...nice to see you over here! I don't know about that, but it seems kind of inefficient as a way to make a fingerboard. I'd think that to really take advantage of the compression strength, you'd want a real layup. I patented a carbon fiber fingerboard with stiffening webs back in 1989 when I wo...

Yeah, unfortunately I've found myself usually in the middle of audiophile heaven...that place where it actually has to sound good or you're homeless and reviled for daring to let inferior sound loose on all the latte drinking cougars who would otherwise subject you to all the hidden pages of the Kam...

I guess if you don't mind a rubbery damper glued around the top of your instruments it's just fine...

A thought...

I need to book my flights over for the Cairns Ukulele Festival in late June/early July, and I'm considering a couple of days in Melbourne. Any interest in getting a luthiers' group together and having me chat and hopefully not drool over your instruments? I need to do this pretty quickly...

Got it. Thanks, Link. Makes sense...

Allen, what about the amine blush issue? I now sand back the epoxy a bit, wash the surface with a damp maroon ScotchBrite pad, and then hit it with a coat of Waterlox before spraying subsequent coats of anything. I did have some serious adhesion issues a couple of months ago that I put down to amine...

Kiwigeo...no, it's Italian and originally it was "Take-a-Mine" As in one guy busted a string on his guitar and the other guy was offering him his own guitar to play...

Isn't that it?

My solution isn't cheap, but it sounds really good. I use a modified D-TAR Timberline with the head shrink sliced off of the pickup cable, the cable shortened, and the preamp modified so that battery power comes up on the "ring" of a stereo cable from an external battery box. This puts the preamp in...

For as specific as I think you want to be, you'd be best off working with a good luthier who can watch you play and see where going low with the action might get you in trouble. This gets to being something very hard to do with mere words or even photos.

I think you can turn the monitor off and still like the arrangement and joy with which they play so well. It just plain sounds great.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcsSPzr7ays

And they're having fun!

There must be some decent Yamahas floating around. I, of course, forgot about the need to cut a new leftie string nut, but that would add a bit to the conversion cost. Still, a decent used guitar with a conversion might be less expensive than holding out for that rare leftie. And Bob and admin folks...

One other thing. It's not all that big a deal to convert a guitar from right handed to left. All that needs doing is to fill the saddle slot with the appropriate wood, well fitted and glued, and then rout a new slot at the proper angle for leftie intonation and make a new saddle. Here in the 'States...

It's very commonly used on guitars made in Indonesia and China for the American market, and it's often lightly stained to make it virtually indistinguishable from mahogany (whatever that is!) in the final product. Samick, for instance, uses a lot of nato.

Why not buy a reasonable used guitar that you like and have a good pickup put into it? One of the problems with lo-balling a luthier is that he or she will wind up resenting having taken on the job as the build time stretches out and the dollars per hour drop below minimum wage. You'll wind up with ...