el charango

 this picture was taken 4-18-08, the day i received this armadillo shell.

 i completed el charango and strung it up for the first time 4-24-13, almost exactly five years from the beginning of this project to the end.

 

there is an undersaddle pickup with an endpin jack installed.

all the dots inlayed on the neck are bamboo.

i stamped it when i completed construction in late 2012. the finish is all shellac, which i took my time with.

i cut out and re-shaped the back of this violin case to fit the charango. 

the lining is from a sweet corduroy vest i had that just didn't fit.

the build

its been on hold for a very long time but i finally got back to working on my charango. i'm using a real armadillo shell that was found in a leather shop in mexico by my mom. it had started to split and i had been too sketched out about getting the shell glued to the neck/frame/lining solidly without cracking it worse in the process. i ended up soaking then boiling and then letting the shell dry into shape. then after a little more fitting it was at long last time to glue it all together. heres what the dry clamp test run looked like.

so now its all downhill. next step is to clean up the lining frame which i left chunky for the clamping. then i cut the soundhole and rosette and get the top ready to go on.

the top of the charango is made of sitka spruce. the upper bout has a veneer inlayed as a fingerguard. i've got the soundhole cut and have started on the rosette. it's going to be alternating white and pink mother of pearl all the way around.

 i completed the rosette and braced the top. a classical fan brace layout seemed logical to me to use since i've never had a chance to look inside any other charangos.

i tend to build instruments i've never actually seen a real physical model of a lot. i'll go off of pictures, drawings and/or measurements. i know, i know, i know that's definitely a habit i need to kick. i should seek out, play and thoroughly inspect the instruments i plan to build. i have played a couple charangos before, i've just never looked inside.

next the lining got trimmed down from it's clamping state and notched for the braces. here the top is ready to glue on, but first i have to deal with some splits in the shell. here you can see a long crack going down the center and a split between the ribs on the right. there was another split on the left side too.

i partially re-boiled the places that needed to get glued up to get the leather pliable, which was actually a lot easier than i had been worrying. the armadillo shell softens quickly in hot water but dries very hard and brittle.

after those repairs were done i glued on the top. i used binding tape since there was no way to clamp to the round back. sorry but i didn't bring my camera the day it was all taped up. to get an idea, here is a bowl back mandolin i'm restoring. i'm using binding tape to pull a split between two staves together. this also gives you a size comparison.

here it is all put together with the finished rosette and the edge routed for binding and purfling. most of the "routing" had to be done by hand.

i decided against mother-of-pearl purfling and went with layered wood like the rosette outline. the color pattern reverses where the fingerplate inlay starts so there are four sections of purfling. i glued each section separately.

the outer binding is rosewood which had to be bent on the bending iron and fit into the ledge then glued in. then i have to carve the binding flush with the edge of the armadillo shell.

i also decided to line the insides of the peghead with veneer, which i bent on a soldering iron. i'm also doing some pink and white shell inlay on the peghead face.

i cut the pieces from shells, flatten the top and bottom surfaces on the sanding board, then shape the inlay with dremel and needle files. but before inlays, the fingerboard gets glued on.

 rough shaping the neck with spokeshave.

one last thing to make up for not doing a mother-of-pearl edge inlay, i'm doing a carving on the heel.

 rough sketch and starter lines cut into one side that i'll transfer to the other.

after the neck is shaped and carved, i finish inlay work on the head. then the bridge gets shaped and glued on and that's it except for shellac and strings.

after the finish work is done i scrape off shellac from where the bride goes and glue it in place. then the pickup, strap pins and tuners get installed and i can string it up.

Fender certified technician

 at long last i've gotten my Fender guitar technician certification. only a formality really since i've been doing most of the warranty work at the shop for years now. i am only silver level because i didn't send them photos of a complete build beginning to end. once i show them that i can get re-certified for gold level.

the Outlaw

 here is a semi-hollow-acoustic-electric-guitar-mandolin-archtop-doubleneck (the Outlaw for short) i made in 2009 for brian of the Knotwells.

 

 this instrument is called "the outlaw" because the original guitar body was used to smash the security camera in a pawn shop robbery. the head was broken off and the lower bout of the bass side was busted out.

this turned out to be perfect for my purposes. i would need to cut away the entire bass side anyway, and i wanted both headstocks to be of my own design.

 i started by removing the bass side and back almost to the edge of the blocks, and by cutting a scarf joint for the new guitar head. i saved as much of the binding as i could.

the mandolin portion is mostly solidbody. i glued in stacked pine boards with holes drilled through to lower weight. the neck block itself is mahogany. the four sticks inside the body are for gluing in linings. the top patch is oak, not a match but the grain lined up decently.

 the guitar fingerboard is the original. i inlayed the mando fingerboard to match. both are rosewood, as are the bridges. the mando bridge has a piezo under-saddle pickup going to a pre-amp.

 the necks and bass side and back are all mahogany. the rest of the body is the original plywood.

 

 i was hoping the new wood and laquer would darken up over time. i also didn't get to take photos until after it got nice and dinged up.

 the headcaps are bookmatched cherry i picked from a scrap bin while visiting seattle. the guitar tuners are from an old electra.

i also built a case since one wasn't available in this shape anywhere. walking into a club with a case like this always gets people wondering what's inside.

 this is the main guitar used on our recording "the highway won't hide you".  the mandolin parts were recorded with a gibson 1910's a-style.

dreadnaught style guitar

i built this for a former co-worker back in 2002 (?) she had me build it to give to her fiance, and all i had to go on for input was: "he likes blondes, and Bruce Springsteen" 

 

the top is sitka spruce. the neck, back, and sides are flamed maple. the bridge and fingerboard are cocobolo. the trim and inlay are spalted maple, cocobolo, and pipestone

  the bridge is loosely inspired by the Kasha style guitar bridge. the back has a double x-brace pattern. the top has an unusual single x-brace pattern.

the body is a very large jumbo style, and is actually offset from the centerline in sort of an &ampersand shape. this is an ergonomic design idea, to shift the lower bout downward (treble sideway), to reduce the area under the forearm without taking away any body volume.

the cocobolo heart volute splice was the result of a measuring lesson i had to learn during the building process. i try to deal with my mistakes in artistic ways if i can't make them invisible.

i don't who ended up getting the guitar in the divorce so i have lost track of this instrument. (hence the not better quality photos)

small scale steel string guitar

this is a small scale acoustic i built for my former boss to give to his kids to learn on. 

at the time i think his oldest of four was 12 years old. the main consideration with that in mind was to build it to be durable. i went with an ebony fingerboard and bridge for the added strength.

all the wood on the body is extra thick and heavily braced. i also used an oversized pickguard, which as you can see by the gigantic scratch below the bridge could've stood to be bigger. 

next it had to be easy to play for small hands, i believe i used a 22" scale length, i probably have it written down somewhere, i'll check on that. 

 the neck, back and sides are mahogany, the top is salvaged redwood. the binding and inlays are cream vinyl

 

one last feature i added for the beginning guitarist was numbered frets. i made a set of letter and number stamps from an old typewriter, i use them for dating and numbering my instruments(most times).