Welcome back to another entry on this Venezuelan Cuatro build. Last time, we finished part of the work related to the fretboard by making the slots to get everything set in place for the glue up on the neck. Today, we are going to work on the other pieces we need to get ready to star assembly and have all things ready for quicker work.
Let's get to it!
Back Thicknessing
We had already glued the pieces of the back together to have one blank. Now we are using the hand plane, card scraper and sandpaper to get it to the thickness we need on the build. This step required removing quite a lot of shavings until the uneven spots are removed and the surface is not only flat but also smooth.
When that part is done, we can go ahead and start marking all the pencil lines until we have all the shapes in place. That means the outlines for the curves and the bars are in place.
The last thing we can add here is the reinforcement for the joint between the two pieces of back.
Shape of the bars
We can start shaping the bars on the sound board. The tools for this are the trusty chisel. Removing from the top of the bars until we can get the height required. Then we use the chisel to get parts from the edges to create the slopes. Finally, the bars get smoother by removing material from the corners until we make them slimmer towards the center. Finally, we sand the bars to get a smooth finish.
Once the bars are finished, we can get to work on the outline of the sound board. We use our coping saw to start removing the edges of the top piece and following the marks we have already made. Then we just use the saw carefully until we have remove all the excess material and we get a sound board with all its shape.
Then we can start looking towards making the strum guard.
Strum guard
It is an important piece to work on. We need to make all the work to measure where we will create the hole that will match the sound hole on the sound board. When the measures are done, we start with the cutting. First, we use the drill to open the center of this piece. Then we use the circle cutter to slowly get the round hole bigger. We might need to use the coping saw to work on this if we do not get the complete hole at once.
We can use a blade to remove any of the other excess material that is preventing the circle from being complete. This strum guard is going to have some other details that we will add by using some pieces of purpleheart and a bit of white veneer.
So the next steps are measuring the width of the piece of purpleheart until we get the right looking piece. Once we are sure it is the right shape for the aesthetics, we can proceed to the glue up. We use some glue to make sure the pieces stay in place during the necessary amount of time.
And the task is not complete until we get the strum guard onto the sound board. We just need to make sure we get everything aligned perfectly. We make a practice run and then proceed to the glue up. And thus we have the guard on the sound board and that piece is ready for assembly.
Thanks a lot for reading. See you next time!
| Entry | Name | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The 19th Venezuelan Cuatro | |
| 2 | Heel and Bars | |
| 3 | Head Stock and Carve | |
| 4 | Fretboard |
Photos 📷: Redmi Note 13
Thumbnail 🖼️: Canva.
Editing 🎬:Adobe Photoshop Lightroom.
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