Working On The Soundboard - Day 1

I started work on the guitar on Thursday 19Th July 2007.



I spent about an hour placing all my bits and pieces around the workshop, it's good to have a place for everything when you start out, it makes cleanup and awful lot faster.


I spent about 2 hours working on the guitar itself.

Here's how I got on....



DAY ONE - (Hours: 2. Total time: 2hrs)


I clamped the two book matched pieces of Western Red Cedar together.
Then I used a plane to bring the edges level:





I used two pieces of scrap timber on either side to stop the jig pinching the wood, but also to widen the top surface and make it easier to keep the plane level. Having never used a plane before I wasn't as accurate as I had to be for this delicate job. I ended up using another method which may come in handy; leaving the clamps on, I taped a piece of sandpaper(I think it was 120grit) to the flat surface of the workbench and making sure to keep it level like so:





We continued to do it until the dust went from this:






To this:





- the reason being it was a flat surface afterwards whereas before it had a slight concave arc to it.

The next step was checking that they were a good match. Hold them up to a window or a light, pressing lightly together, check for a sliver of light coming through, it can occur in more than one place, if it does, back in the clamps with it!


This process actually took a good while, but trial an error is all part of it.



When I was happy with the sides I ran some Titebond glue down one side:

The last thing you do is find a clean flat surface, and lay a strip of wax paper down the same length as the pieces of wood, this is to stop the glue bonding the soundboard to your workbench!

Place a small strip of wood(1-2cm cubed and longer than the pieces of wood) underneath the middle of the soundboard & screw 3 screws in either side to keep up the "Peak" and make it as tight as you can. You'll damage the edges doing this, but you'll be cutting them off pretty soon anyway. It'll look like this:

- I should point out at this stage that these steps were all done BEFORE I put that glue on!!

Holding the sides level, press down along the glued edge until the two boards are flat. WARNING if you had the peak too high you could damage or even break the boards at this point, so be aware of the stress levels in the wood as you're applying pressure.

Finally I placed an old varnished windowsill on top of it, the varnish won't let the glue stick that much to it, and was easy to come off when we removed it the next day. To apply extra weight for the joining process I placed some stones form the garden on top of the windowsill.

24 hours.

24 hours you wait for the glue to dry.

24 hours for any glued joint to dry.

24 hours.