DIY Network

Handmade Guitar, Part 9: Completing the Body From "Handmade Music" episode DHMM-103

	Lynn Dudenbostel is a nationally known luthier, and builds guitars by hand in the tradition of the classic Martin guitars made in the 1930s.
	Lynn hand-shapes the guitar's neck from a block of solid mahogany.

In this third episode of DIY's Handmade Music Lynn Dudenbostel demonstrates how he adds this decorative element to his guitars. Vintage guitars were bound with distinctive herringbone strips that framed a guitar's perimeter, and Lynn uses the same technique on his guitars. With binding in place, the Dudenbostel guitar body is complete, and after a quick sound test Lynn turns his attention to the guitar neck. Lynn shows viewers how to slowly carve away wood from a block of mahogany until a perfectly shaped neck remains. He then attaches an inlayed fingerboard and prepares the guitar for finish.

In addtion, host Jeff Wilson drops in on George Gruhn of the world-famous Gruhn Guitars in Nashville to learn more about the quality of vintage guitars. The show closes with more music from Kentucky Thunder. It's a session that delivers a "sneak peak" at the completed Dudenbostel Guitar.

In this first segment, Lynn Dudenbostel finishes up work on the body of the guitar by adding the decorative herringbone binding.

Materials:

Guitar binding
Table router
Sharp chisel and mallet
Acetone-based glue
Masking tape
Cabinet scraper
Sandpaper
Safety glasses or goggles

Safety Alert: Always wear safety goggles or safety glasses when
working with wood, power-tools, saws, drills, routers, etc.

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Guitar Body and Binding

In earlier segments, Lynn Dudenbostel created the guitar's top from prized red-spruce wood and crafted the back and curved sides from Indian rosewood. He also added the internal support structures and tone bars that help give the guitar its trademark resonating sound. He added decorative marquetry inlays and purfling around the sound hole -- in keeping with the details on the vintage guitars which this one is based upon. Once kerfed lining is added and the parts are all glued while held securely in a custom form, the result is a fully formed guitar body (figure A). But there's still work to do before the guitar takes its final form (figure B).

Figure A

Figure B

Binding is the material that frames the guitar's body. Lynn uses a traditional herring-bone style reminiscent of classic Martin guitars (figures C and D). This visual accent enhances the look, but not the sound, of the instrument.

Figure C

Figure D

• To complete this finishing touch on the guitar body, Lynn uses the table router to make a precision cut along the guitar's edges, making a channel for the binding (figure E). He uses a 1/4-inch spiral router-bit and depth gauge to cut a narrow rabbet, or ledge, around the edge of the guitar's body (figure F) on both the top and back. The ledge will be used to accept the binding.

  Figure E

  Figure F

  
  

  Figure G

• As he works, Lynn checks the accuracy of the cut using the binding as his guide.

• Before adding the binding, he then trims a "v" in the rosewood and spruce at the guitar body's upper end (figure G) to clear the way for the dovetail joint that will connect the guitar's body to the neck. In an earlier segment he carved and glued a mahogany head-block inside the body with a v-shaped notch that now matches the one carved out section in the body.
  
• With the dovetail notch cut, work can begin on binding the guitar. He begins by applying a bead of acetone-based glue into the channel he's cut around the guitar. He then begins taping the binding in place, starting at one end of the guitar body and working his way around the perimeter (figures H and I).

  Figure H

  Figure I

  
  

  	Figure J
  	Figure K
  	Figure L

• The glue-up is tedious and detailed work, and actually requires gluing of two strips of binding along the rabbet -- the herring-bone patterned strip and a plain white strip that is glued on the outside and runs parallel to the guitar's sides. Plenty of tape is used to hold the two strips in place as the glue dries. Some of the excess glue is wiped away before it begins to dry. Any that can't be removed in that way will be cleaned away later using sandpaper. Once the binding has been applied completely around the top of the guitar, the gluing process is repeated on the guitar back (figure J). Like the herring-bone binding used on the front, the strip used on the back is historically accurate -- an ivory-like strip that completes the vintage look.

• Once all of the strips have been glued in place, the guitar body is set aside to dry. After the glue has dried overnight, the masking tape can be removed. This step requires considerable caution since removing the tape could tear the fibers of the spruce surface. Lynn carefully pulls each strip back over itself, rather than pulling straight up, to remove the tape without damage. Finally, a cabinet scraper is used (figure K), in combination with sandpaper, to soften the sharp edge of the binding and provide a smooth, radiused edge.

• Once scraping and sanding is done, the guitar's body is essentially complete. At this point, Lynn uses a traditional luthier's trick -- which he learned from luthier Wayne Henderson of Virginia -- to "test" the quality of the guitar body. A lit match is held directly in front of the guitar's sound hole. A solid tap to the guitar's top will cause the body to resonate. If the air currents coming from the hole blow the match out (figure L), the body of the guitar is deemed to be "a winner."
  

  John Arnold, who harvested and supplied the red spruce for the guitar's top, gives a sheet of the spruce lumber the "tap test." The tightly grained red spruce has unique resonating qualities, and produces a sustained "ring" -- rather than a "thud" -- when tapped.

RESOURCES :

Kentucky Thunder
For more information on the band that appeared in DIY's Handmade Music, Kentucky Thunder -- and to hear streaming audio and download samples of their music -- visit the website for Skaggs Family Records, www.skaggsfamilyrecords.com.

Stewart MacDonald's Luthier Supply Shop
Website: www.stewmac.com

Luthier's Mercantile International, Inc.
Website: www.lmii.com

Pioneer Valley Luthier Supply Company
Website: www.pioneervalleyluthier.com

GUESTS :

Lynn Dudenbostel, Luthier
Dudenbostel Stringed Instruments
Knoxville, TN

John Arnold, Luthier
Newport, TN

Ted Davis, Luthier
Loudon, TN