Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

Well, I´m back here...I admit a bit late... sorry! First of all thanks for your help! Meanwhile I have changed some things on my (homemade) guitar: I sprayed the top into yellowish or "Vintage Amber" because I like the (fake :wink: ) older hue of that. Then I made the neck a bit wider with stripes o...

Thanks for your friendly help! First of all I´ll get me a real straight edge to measure the fret tops. I did that before only with a small aluminium tube I had lying on a shelf. Then I will file down the previous frets of the buzzing ones with a fret file . I hope that will solve this nasty problem....

Maybe somebody could give me a hint how to get rid of light buzzing above the 12th/13th frets of my new made baritone guitar.. When looking alongside the neck from the headplate down to the soundhole the neck shows a little bow in the region of fret 10 up to fret 14. Maybe I should make the bone sad...

Martin thanks for your friendly reply! I think I formulated my dusty problem not right: it´s no dust particles in the epoxy but after nitro lacquer finishing the guitar keeps gathering a bit of dust on the outside layer. I guess it might be the same "electric" thing with a comb rubbed on a sheet of ...

Now this second acoustic build is almost completed.(12-string baritone) I took off the white plastic bindings from the neck and glued on thin stripes of muninga wood I still had on the shelf. With nitro lacquer they now show their nice flaming. I sprayed the spruce top this time only with clear fini...

Here are a couple of photos of the first and the second pore filling with epoxy. The first one had way too much epoxy .The squeegee was a bit too soft but with the second one I used my mastercard with only a teaspoonful of epoxy. I still have to sand and perhaps fill once again before spraying nitro...

Thank you all for your help and your sympathy!

Yeah, I´ve got it - at least the two first ones. Even the short binding in the cutaway isn´t too bad. There´s the last tree bindings awaiting for their hot treatments. One is still taking it´s bath in a mixture of fabric softener and water since yesterday evening. I have got a spare one if it doesn´...

Trevor, thanks for your detailed instructions. I will try to get a tad more temperature with a gas torch blowing into the steel tube of the bending iron. Btw, is the last binding dark snakewood? Wayne, I tried to bend nicely figured muninga binding this afternoon. I started with the "U"-shaped flore...

Wayne, thank you, I´ll give it a try

I gave up with the snakewood. I bent it but in the waist were some splints coming out. I will use it another time. I have received a set of nicely figured muninga bindings yesterday and still am fighting those nasty little splits mainly in the waist curves. I will pursue my bending tomorrow but if t...

Wayne, thanks for adding these photos + description!

Just a dummy´s question: What is "fabric softener" ?

Is that the stuff used in laundries or at home in washing machines?

Martin, thank you for your detailed infos, especially for the 2 photos! Blackwood here in Germany is very scarce and ordering it from Australia is a bit complicated because of the distance and shipping time. So I just now have ordered a set of koa binding at a wood shop here. I hope bending that wil...

Hi Jeremy, thanks for your informations! Of course I mean bindings... :wink: I have had a tough afternoon today bending the snakewood strips . I could not avoid two more or less decent splints in the narrower curves of the waist. I will try to close those gaps while gluing them into the routed chann...

I´m looking for an alternative if my bending binding/purfling/linings with
snakewood doesn´t work like I want it. (splintering... etc)
I found two other quite interesting woods :
Tasmanian blackwood and Koa.

Which of them would be better to bend?.
I use a bending iron with a heating fan.

....Also I used liquid fabric softener to get some stubborn wood to bend without breaking. Mixed it with water and let it soak over night dried it and bent it. Thanks for your help! I stumbled over "veneer softener". Must give that liquid a try. Maybe overnight like you did. If the snakewood doesn´...

Jeremy D wrote:What was the solvent you used?

I used "Glutoclean" -especially made for getting rid of stickers.
It contains naphta and tridecet-9 (what ever this is)

I tried naphta which took off some of the residue but left some patches over. Then I tried a solvent which is made to soften and take off stickers. I made a probe on a piece of nitro finished ply wood before touching the guitar. This worked and I could rub off nearly all of the adhesive. Now I´m wai...

kiwigeo wrote:Naptha would work.

Thanks!
I will give it a try.

The pickguard of my nitrocellulose finished guitar was loose
and came almost off.
So I decided to glue it anew but the adhesive sheet has to have no old residue beneath.
How can I get rid of the old adhesive traces?
Naphta...?

@ Bruce McC :
Thats a nice jig!
Thanks for sharing.
I´ll make one for the next bending.

Thanks for your help!
I will try to get some Supersoft and give it a try.
Maybe a thin sheet of steel would help too.

I´ve never bent snakewood bindings. With my second acoustic guitar I want to do it because I like the look but I am a bit insecure how I should bend without breaking or splitting. I will use my bending tube ( ca.4" diameter) heated with a heat gun. What temperature is best? How long should I wet the...