The top is radiata pine salvaged from some bunk beds (5 pieces); the falcate bracing is Oregon pine from a second hand door off the old outside dunny; the back is light red meranti (4 piece) from the shelving out of a kitchen cupboard (braced with Oregon), the sides, neck and linings are from what I think is dark red meranti (or some other Shorea species) from another shelf of the same cupboard (the heel is a five layer lamination); the headstock facing is huon pine from the ends of an old spice rack; the rosette is red gum (I think) from a bit of firewood that had some figure in it (the black lines are cardboard!!); the bindings, back stripe, heel cap and fretboard binding are from a piece of figured jarrah that used to be a fence paling. The fretboard is brush box. It took a lot of work to figure out what it was. It was from the bottom plate of a stud wall. It was either brush box or turpentine, both possibilities in this area, but the flame test proved it to be brush box. The fret edge markers are from a set of 3mm aluminium knitting needs found in the bottom of a wardrobe (which then lived in the cutlery drawer for 12 years (!)). The bridge is more of that dark red meranti. Gotoh tuners, with my usual nut and saddle compensation. The sound board is finished with high gloss French polish (!) and the back and sides are finished with nitro.
So, I can already hear the question "How does it sound"? Well, unlike Taylor, Benedetto or Bucknall, I'm not going to tell you that it sounds as good as my usual guitars. It doesn't. Radiata has a density 30% greater than Engelmann and is only ~65% as stiff (well, that's how these bits measured up), so you start well behind the eight ball and that straight away limits the monopole mobility you can get. But having said that, it will still blow the nuts of most things you can buy in a shop. So it definitely has the Gore family sound, but not quite as much of it. Having been strung less than a day, I expect the sound to develop some and become more refined, but it's never going to be as loud as most of my other instruments, but plenty loud enough none the less. The real test, of course, is will it be a guitar I will pick up and play? And the answer, I think, will be yes.
The great learning out of this, though, is that I used all my standard design techniques (thicknessing formulae etc.) on wood species that I'd never used before and they all worked. It's a 100/180/226 guitar for those who recognise those numbers.
Here's some pics:
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- DSCF2318s.jpg (40.6 KiB) Viewed 45773 times
- DSCF2305s.jpg (47.08 KiB) Viewed 45773 times
- DSCF2308s.jpg (41.87 KiB) Viewed 45773 times
