17" wide body, 3" deep at edges. 24.625" scale, 1.7" at nut. Top is made from alaskan yellow cedar. Back and sides made from english sycamore (european maple). Neck is a composite of birdseye maple, moradillo and padauk. fretboard is cambodian rosewood. Peghead veneer, tailpiece, pickguard and bridge are ziricote. Mahogany endblocks. Redwood linings. Spruce braces (parallel). Brazilian rosewood binding. Grover tuners.
Building this guitar was a 2 year experience.... I'd figured on one, but things took longer. In late November 1995, I got hold of Benedetto's book on archtop construction, not really intending to build one, but interested in the 'secrets' - top and back thicknesses, bracing, etc. In December I went to the local Paxton's Fine Woods, and they had just received a qunatity of very nice english sycamore. I realized that I could use some yellow cedar I'd bought a couple of years before for mandolins, and with this sycamore be able to build an archtop. Through December I designed the guitar (outline and arching), built the mold, planned the bracing, and actually started working on the guitar on Jan. 1, 1995. After 3 days trying to plane the top and back joints by hand, I gave up and bought a jointer, which accomplished the job in under 5 minutes. I marked the arching contours on the outside of the top and back in 1/16" increments of thickness, and drilled holes to within 1/8" of the depth. Then the carving started - I used a 5/8" gouge and a couple of small curved-bottom planes I had made some years back. One is 1" wide, made from the blade of a small Stanley plane reground to shape, the other uses a reground 1/2" Exacto blade. Both have wood bodies. Working an average of 4 to 5 hours a week, I had the outsides carved by summer. Other than planning the initial drilling, I didn't use any templates, just my eyes and hands. The insides were drilled to achieve an initial thickness - 5/8" for the top, 3/8" for the back - and then they were worked down to the final thicknesses in the same way as the top. The back ended at 3/16" overall, the top is about 1/4" at the bridge, thinner other places. I used a little hand-made plywood caliper, not superaccurate but close enough. The top and back were done by late 1995 (only 2 months were lost to computer games). Bending the sides and gluing them up didn't take but a couple of weeks. Sides were bent using the old hot-pipe method. By summer, I had the body glued and bound (losing February and March to illness).
After that came the neck. Initial gluing and shaping took about a month. Doing the inlay took about three weeks (the first and last time I try to do a fractal!!) ( That's what I thought... the latest guitar - a custom order - will have a fractal). Fitting the neck-body joint and final shaping took me into November. Gluing up, sanding and finishing took me into the middle of December, when it was strung up (actually, It was strung up for a short time in November to see if I wanted to work on the graduation any - sounded good to me, so I didn't do more than a little scraping on the back). The finish was intended to be a base coat of shellac with a main coat of Qualasole padding lacquer. I learned that reading about French polishing is not really enough to teach you how to do it. So, after almost 2 years (minus about 5-6 months of assorted distractions) it's finally finished... almost. I'm planning to sand back some, break down and buy a spray rig, and spray an overcoat of nitro lacquer. Still, it looks pretty good, and sounds (to my ignorant ears) pretty darn good. A little light on the bass, but pretty balanced overall. The neck came out great - everyone who's played it has liked it (all 4 people).
The top and back aren't actually bookmatched, but are from the same piece of wood. The front was not quite wide enough, so about 1" 'wings' were glued at the widest point. Had I done a better job there, they would be unnoticeable, but... The fittings are ziricote, a lovely wood with amazing grain that really doesn't show up in these pictures. This guitar was built basically with the philosophy of using what I had or could get locally. The only things not meeting this criteria were the fretboard ,bindings and endblocks. As a first archtop (and first guitar in almost 15 years) I'm very pleased with the results... and now I have a nice archtop to play.
1998 update - still haven't refinished it (still haven't bought a spray rig - this Fall I hope), but it sure does sound good. It has a clear, delicate sound played softly - good for fingerpicking - and gets a honking tone when really beat on for rythm (with an interesting Dobro-esque sound)
Please let me know if you have any comments or questions.
Send Email to drfuzz@aol.com.
(Note: If you send Email and recieve no reply, please try again.... and excuse my occasional mental lapse)
Dr. Fuzz - Rev. June 1998
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