MIMF

One alternative to consider would be to use waterborne poly with Honey Amber Transtint dye added to it (about 6-8 drops per quart will give that warm aged pine look). The advantage is a low cost and foam brush application. EnduroVar urethane varnish is what I am presently using, and they have a semi...

Jim,
The dovetail tenon (and mortise depth) is 3/4" long. Looks like this: The screw is 2-1/2" #8 brass to match the gold hardware. The location is where I would want the strap button to be anyway: Hope this helps!

Jim, I use a dovetail joint similar to what you describe and try for a nice tight fit. I do not use glue for final assembly, but instead a 2.5" screw capped with a strap button runs through the dovetail to lock it in place. This means that I can assemble in the white, play and refine, then disa...

Looks really good! - What kind of spruce and the source? - Any details you can share on the neck joint? (Dovetail?). - Fretboard material? My preference is for a brighter tone for neck pickups, and as you say it tone can be rolled off. It looks like you have 21 frets, putting your neck pickup at abo...

Steve: I had done maybe 100's of setups, dozens of pickup installations, etc. but had never tried to build an instrument, even from a kit. Woould have been easier to perhaps build a solid body (I've got a soft spot for Tele's) but just wanted to go all in. So, the first edition of the Journal was tr...

I have continued to build and learn since posting my original Archtop Build Journal. The original thread is here: http://www.mimf.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=3905 The Archtop Build Journal - Fifth Edition can be found here: http://www.mimf.com/Builds/Archtop%20Build%20Journal%20-%20Fifth%20Ed...

Randolph: Since I was not entirely sure of the end results, a lower cost humbucker was a reasonable option and a lower price/pain point if I messed it up. This really sounds good, so I'll start thinking about an upgrade in a few months - probably Vintage Vibe since this a custom configuration (no mo...

Thanks David! The Golden Age was a decent price (about $50 USD) and I knew I would be modifying it for this build, so it was a reasonable choice. I have used Vintage Vibe (Pete Biltoft) neck mounted humbuckers on prior builds. Pete is great to order from but not cheap at $125 or so. The neck mounted...

No guitar post is complete without the obligatory shot of the back: //mike

Shatten thumbwheels for volume and tone control are hidden inside the edge of the bass side f-hole: N7-132 Pots in f hole.JPG The humbucker height levels out with the fretboard height with a good clearance and room for string to string balance using the pole pieces. N7-131 Side view HB and neck exte...

A Dremel with a metal cutting blade trimmed off the standard mounting tabs and reduced the extra length of the pole piece screws: N7-006 Modified Humbucker.jpg After the build was finished we can feed the shielded cable through a hole in the front plate. Double sided tape adhesive attached the humbu...

]A thread by Greg Martin some time ago discussed using a full size humbucker with a carved archtop: http://www.mimf.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=4245 I have finally completed a build using a surface mounted full size neck position humbucker on a 16" carved archtop guitar: N7-220 Front righ...

Perhaps you have already checked ths, but maybe the nut slots are a little higher than necessary? If so, that can leave a length of string free to vibrate behind the fretted position (between the nut and the fingered position). I encountered an issue like this with a steel string some years ago, and...

I've read somewhere that CA glue starts to age once the container is opened and exposed to air and moisture. I have seen some tubes that have been opened for some time fail to cure correctly and/or very slowly. In recent years I have been buying the smaller tubes like they sell at Walmart in an atte...

Barry, You can definately split it. Red maple makes great firewood ;-) It may be a bit wasteful to try and create wedges when sawing would give a better yield. I have had really good results with flat and rift sawn maple boards. I don't think that having purely quartered maple is a structural concer...

We had a 20" diameter red maple cut down some years ago. Not curly but nice and clear, with the some darker or grayer areas since the tree was storm damaged some years before. Local sawyer (and co-worker) picked up the 6' to 7' long logs for me and sawed to 2.5" thick slabs. Peeled off bar...

Eric, The Detailed Build section is relatively new. Charlie created it when I contacted him about how to upload and share my Archtop Build Journal. Putting all of the detail from the Journal into a thread would be interesting in terms of the forum dialog it can generate, but not really convenient as...

The discussion rightly focuses on design. But one positive aspect of luthierie is the wonderfully open sharing of ideas, methods and knowledge by established "masters" and all the way down to newbies like me. There is very little of the trade secret protectionist behavior. This whole forum...

Thanks Brian and Bryan, I my case I am quite happy with my homemade hot pipe for bending sides, etc. My goal is to warm and bend small pieces of binding for inlays, for which I am presently using a cup of boiling water. I am also specing out an F style mandolin build, and there are some pretty tight...

Any make-models to recommend? I'm thinking about getting one also for the same purpose!