Murphy's Laws of Lutherie

Dave Skowron - 11:16am Nov 22, 1998
Hopefully someday to become a full-blown amateur luthier.

Murphy's Law strikes everywhere. Let's put together a list as it applies in the lutherie field. I'll start off with:

1). The accuracy of a purchase is inversely proportional to the distance to the source of said purchase. (This one applies everywhere). Additionally, the part you forget to include in your LMI or Stew-Mac order will be the first part you need, and will be that part without which the other parts you ordered remain useless. This usually only happens over holidays when the source of the order is closed for a week, starting the day you receive your order.

1a). The part you need most is back-ordered for 6 weeks.

2). When clamping, if you need to use all of your clamps, you will be short by one.

3). Only your most rare and expensive wood will break when bending.

4). All practice pieces come out perfect. Expanding on this, You can never make the same perfect piece twice in a row.

The final coat of varnish is the coat that refuses to dry completely.

The finger you lose to the table saw is always the one you need most.

Law of Inanimate Reproduction.

If you take something apart and reassemble it enough times eventually you will wind up with two of them

I've found two things to be absolute truths.

1. A tool or part, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible place in your shop.

2. NEVER, NEVER, pull a sharp abject towards yourself... Always away!

Polishing out one abberant scratch in the finish invariably produces several other abberant scratches in the finish.

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