Part 3 of Conjurer series
Woodconjuring (woodworking)
Time flies but every now and then I return to do some conjuring. I've been busy doing regular wood working like tables and Les Paul. And after all this is still part time thing and designing new model is kind of a hobby in this whole.
I've selected woods for first one, which will have domestic woods I've gathered myself. Exotic one is bit harder because I need to find one particular fretboard blank.
Conjurer model will have thick bottom, second layer with neck and top wood. It might be bit different than what they sell in guitar store.
Bottom blank
For bottom I selected wood called bird cherry, hackberry, hagberry (Prunus Padus). It's common tree, but there is not wood store that sells it. It's guite dense and light colored wood. It has good shine if planed.
Hackberry blank |
Planed and glued |
Edges router with template |
Second layer with neck
Model will include neck through construction with twist. Wings in second layer will be same wood specie as neck wood. With some really special wood this might not be wise, but for at least I will start like this.
So for neck and sides I chose rowan. Side blanks was bit short but they worked fine. Neck blank was selected from bigger and straight grained blank.
Body ready |
Top wood
Years ago my brother and I salvaged big ash (relatively big in this area) near by and I've been waiting project where I can use it. First I though the body will be ash, but it turns out really beautiful with flaming so it's going to be top wood. I've also wanted to use ash as a top wood so I can put some nice color to it.
Actual ash blank wasn't really good. It had big knot and crotch, but they actually provided that nice flamed section in center by compressing those wood fibers. By my calculations that knot is right where neck pickup cavity will be routed.
Fretboard
For fretboard I selected apple tree which is quite hard and actually one of the hardest woods in Finland. I gathered this log from friends yard many years ago and it has been lying around in workshop for couple years already.
I made little video from sawing and planing that log.
Video
Multiscale
As said earlier this will be multiscale guitar. Actually first one from me. I draw lines to fretboard and thew just sawed through line with block of wood for guiding my saw.
And then some pretty basic fretboard markers from white mother of pearl.