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George and Gene told me about the way the makers in Mexico worked up until recently. Probably in the DF in big shops it's been fairly modern all along, but out in the country areas like Paracho not until the 1990 does it get more up to date.
Gene told me old band saw blades were used for merchant marine knives, a guy would get a hank of steel from the engineer and make a knife in the machine shop on board. Gene was a radio operator, but he showed me the knife he made when he went to sea at 16.
He used to take me to the coffee shop, or I took him, it was round robin of coffees and pastries- we would talk, but mainly I drew him out on stories about NY guitar making scene in the 60's and his normal routine as a radio man on a ship. His route was Boston to SF/ Seattle, either via the canal or around the southern cone. Before he would tell the good stories he made me learn to tie a few knots. He could tie any difficult merchants knot, and he had piece of rope in a bag at the coffee shop one day. He said watch this...he tied some fancy sheep head knot that borked up my mind. Then walked me through it.
His thing was kids these days, you don't make your own work knife or know cargo knots. Learn if you want to know about guitar making.
He was genuinely salty, and I learned a lot of esoteric history. That really helps these days when I need to shout: ' You kids get off my lawn! That ball comes in the yard, it's mine!'
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
I was a commercial boat captain for many years and had to learn a ton of knots. Now I help make navigation data for ships and the navy. Probably used only 3 day to day and an occasional spllce to attach life saving equipment.
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
Gene said you only need three four knots, really, but in his day to you got a street cred for knowing a few more.
I like to go to the port and watch the fish auctions, lots of big boats in the Akune fleet. It's a sardine fishery, and up coast 15 miles yellowtail. There's still a lot of net mending skill alive. I love all the sea lore, but respect, it's hard work.
This isolation from the greater music world has taken a toll on me, but it's a trade off privilege to know a sea going culture up close.
Posts: 3471
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
quote:
ORIGINAL: estebanana
Gene said you only need three four knots, really, but in his day to you got a street cred for knowing a few more.
Same deal if you own a cruising sailboat. You don't really need many knots, but if you can sit around shooting the breeze and whip off a few good ones on a piece of cord, it impresses the landlubbers.
The knots in the rigging of the model ships found in Egyptian tombs from thousands of years ago are the same knots that are taught today.
First time I went to Java we drove west along the north coast from Banyuwangi at the eastern tip of the island. When we were around boats I checked out the knots. They were the same as the ones in the 1940a Boy Scout Manual.
It's been a long time since I read "The Lost World" by Conan Doyle, but I remember a passage where the adventurers were captured and held by the ape-men. The ape-man who confined them could hardly speak, but "he could tie like a bosun."
[Bosun = boatswain: a ranking non-commissioned officer of a sailing ship's crew. Also an occupational rating in many modern navies.]
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
My grandfather taught me the knots to tie down loads to trucks. I showed Gene a half hitch variation and he laughed. Then made me learn a more difficult one.
This is a solera I made in 2005, I built some nice guitars on this one.
I made it with pattern makers nails, 'U' shaped nails that you drive into wood and the nail draws the two pieces together. I could have clamped the pine slats together, but I wanted to lean to use the pattern makers nails at the time. They are useful for edge joining triangular pieces of wood.
The clear pine was chosen on purpose because it can be re planed to true it it up if the solera warps, which it will by 2 or 3 mm over its life. 2mm of warp end to end is enough to make building a guitar a nightmare. So with winding sticks and a plane you can correct any problems. This solera was used for two main plantillas, the smaller pencil line is my 'Torres' scale guitar with an 18 -1/2" back length suitable for smaller scales ( not that it makes much difference, you can put a 640 scale on a full size guitar and it will work.) Smaller plantillas are nice, some players prefer a smaller model. The other is a 1927 Santos plantilla that Gene gave me.
The solera was used to toggle back and forth between building those two models, but when through revisions in arch and other slight adjustments as I changed the approach to the smaller guitar. I don't use this one anymore for building, but I use it as a fixture to clamp guitars to for repair and other stuff.
It used to have a pine neck extension that I could plane into any neck set angle, and then glue shims under the neck face to hold the neck at any set. But it began with about 2MM of ramp.
Scooping out the arch on this kind is much easier than plywood and more fun than MDF, I also don't like MDF because I'm allergic to it. Nasty stuff. But it's basically a form of cardboard and does not hold edges well. It works ok if you seal it with shellac.
I'm not a fan of the flat surface surrounding the plantilla, as shown in Courtnall, he shows two terminal edges if I remember. I like the way the arch goes to the line of the plantilla.
Since it's pine it was easy to carve the arch with a violin plane. My current one is plywood, because I had no choice, but another pine of cedar bedded solera is soon to be made.
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RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
Nice. Something about having the spruce or cedar of the top laying against the softness of pine instead of ply or MDF is appealing. Probably meaningless but it just seems warmer. Looks nice, too.
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
I looked at a photo of Romanillos' solera and he does something like this, so I copied his idea. My soleras before this one were made out of solid redwood. There's tons of cedar here, I might make one of solid cedar. Its sexy to show off in the shop. MDF is not sexy.
Everyone always picking on poor medium density fiberboard. You can't beat it's stability!
Or uniformity. It's pretty much useless for anything but forms for all the reasons Stephen states but it's cheap and readily available. If you can find high density particle board it's a vastly better product but I haven't seen any in years. Used to be a place in Portland, Oregon called Plymart that had it but I don't know if they still exist.
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
MDF is good for the our side mold form if you use that. The thing I don't like is that it does not like fasteners through the edge, it can crack or split unless you predrill. So making boxes or things that require fasteners in the 'end grain' part get loose over time.
RE: Specs in a guitar plan (in reply to estebanana)
That's my main gripe with mdf. fasteners. I don't have the patience for it so I wind out super glueing stuff together for extra security. Right now I'm trying to decide on a Rosette/ color scheme. All the premade rosettes kind of suck. I was going to go with the Reyes rosette but now I want to do something different. And cypress or Pau Ferro?
Stephen, you take your dome all the way to the edge?
The flying bowline will score you some chicks. Well, maybe not, but it's cool and very handy.