Building an OM Guitar with Cherry, Sitka Spruce, and a Blue Herringbone Rosette
These are some pictures of a recent project. They show a quick overview of the process of building a steel-string guitar.
I begin by joining the top and establishing the outside face. Then make the pieces of the rosette and inlay them into the top. After that, thin the top down to near final thickness.
The next step is to install and carve the braces, then fine tune the top. Next, clamp the top and sides into place on the solera. The solera is the work-board the guitar is built on, it shapes the curvature of the top plate and acts as a form to build the guitar on. The sides are glued on and reinforced with tentellones. Then the guitar is closed up and made solid by gluing the back into place.
With the box closed, it’s time to cut a ledge for the binding and purfling. The purfling is glued in place and the individual pieces are joined with many scarf joints staggered so that they remain hidden. The binding is installed and the end graft is inlayed. At this point the neck needs to be prepared and the fingerboard installed.
Carve and set the neck, followed by final clean up. This peghead got an inlay inspired by Stradivari’s decorated violins. Finally the guitar is varnished and then set up. The pictures of the finished guitar were taken by Tim Brown at www.timbrownphoto.com