Ok guys this is a long post hope you don’t mind…
First I would like to thank everyone for their kind words and enthusiasm…
THANK YOU…
on with the show.
As said, “Now 10 pieces are 6”. And here are the recognized pieces in there prospected finale resting places.
Time to hold my breath and glue the main wing portions together with the walnut veneer.
For alignment, I clamped the two pieces together and checking the lines with a square to get proper placement. Once I was satisfied, I took the whole thing clamps and all to the drill press and drilled some holes for dowels (bamboo shish kabob skewers to be precise) to keep things in line while gluing.
With the holes drilled in both mating sections, I then placed the top half on the walnut veneer and drilled corresponding holes, checked that the dowels went all the way through both sections with the walnut in the middle and checked the lines with a square. After fussing over this for a while, I did a dry clamp and checked my alignment again, now the glue, no turning back from here. Let that sit to cure and worked on the other side… We’ve all seen wood being glued up in clamps before, so you’re not missing anything since I didn’t get a pic of that. As the first wing came out of clamps the second goes in and I start trimming the excess walnut veneer and check all the alignment, so far so good… since the first wing is all cleaned up I took it to the next step of gluing up the full thickness stretchers that run parallel with the neck.
This is a basic lamination process, glue one side to the other. Let me take a min. to explain why I did the last layers this way. It’s a structural thing, (in my crazy head it makes good sense) with so many sections coming together to make a whole, it’s good to have one solid piece to tie them together even if it’s as thin as paper. Thankfully it’s a bit thicker than that… so, the walnut veneer is as wide as the wing, giving a little extra horizontal stability (+ there will be a top). The full thickness stretchers (I may have called them stringers earlier, same thing) are to give extra support to the vertical, holding the top and bottom together. There is so much glue this may not be necessary or overkill even, but that’s part of the madness and my reasoning.
With everything out of clamps we have results … fingers crossed… and…
(I didn't get individual pics so don’t worry the pics are coming)The bass wing… looks good, treble wing also looks good… I now will trim all the butt ends on my miter saw to get it smooth and even the ends to see what I really got… well… I must admit, it’s had to share this after everyone’s delightful comments, Tribbinator that wizard pic is not only hilarious but it made me feel all warm and fuzzy when I finished LMAO.
On with it… uh-ho…
to error is human, I’m no wizard…
Not so bad in that pic huh… and here’s the problem pic…
After going through all the possibilities that could have made this accrue in my head, my conclusion… it doesn't matter, this is what I got and I can’t live with it nor do I expect Alex too. So… the fix is in… now, how do I do that? Hmm… After a complete inspection it looks like the butt end kicked out a hair multiplied by the width bla bla bla, I used a square drew a line and measured, (I used a different camera to try and get better pics but it didn't work)
it’s off a 1/32”. The top end looks good so there is a good chance that when the wing is cut to shape the alignment will be closer, so I trimmed a little more off to see. It moved… but not enough for me to be comfortably satisfied… Hmm…
There are too many layers to this onion to try to steam/heat the bad piece apart… so… let’s just cut it out. Yep that’s what I’ll do. First I glued up a new set of lams from the off cuts of this project. Conveniently, I had some that where already the right length & width etc. once glued up I had a new replacement piece a little over the width need.
With a 200 toothed blade that has a 3/32” kerf in my table saw, I set the fence to cut just trough the walnut side of the cheery 1/32”, I just wanted to shave the cherry so I did not lose the mitered corner but straighten it up and removed the original glue between the cheery and walnut. Slowly I increased the height of the blade with each pass till I just missed the bottom of the cherry U-channel. Then, with a micro adjuster, moved my fence till I hit my drawn line… breathe… every thing’s ok…
Next, I planed a little of the cheery side of the new lam insert and flattened the bottom with a jointer, then hand sanded the insert to a snug press fit. The new insert is from the same original woods so I did my best to match grains and glued it in… my results from this operation… I’d say, pretty well.
It’s not perfect, but I’m pleased… the sapele is still slightly off (0.85 mm on the treble wing ONLY), but I’m still convinced that when the body is cut out this will line up more (or at least get closer), it’s also not as noticeable as a black line. I discussed this issue with Alex and we agreed that the risk involved in the repair is much greater than the imperfection. It’s hard for my OCD to let this go, but I think it’s the best course of action. With that, I’m ready to ship.
wings cut.
