Building a Parlor Guitar

I thought that I would describe my building of an instrument from beginning to end. Some years ago I bought a set of plans for a 1930's Washburn Parlor guitar. I love these old vintage instruments and their interesting sound. I will describe building from this plan with as much detail as I can. This could take a while as demands on my time mean that completion of this instrument will probably be a year off. That's how long it can take to build an instrument from scratch, sometimes even longer. Obviously, if you lack bucket loads of patience this hobby probably isn't for you. Just so you know. I also want to demonstrate how to build a guitar with the minimum use of power tools. I prefer to use hand tools when I can. The design I'm using is a simple design which minimizes the need for lots of elaborate jigs such as radius dishes. I will sometimes use some luthier-specific tools. I'll explain my use of them. I also need to say that it has taken me twenty years to get where I am with this hobby and it's unrealistic to expect that you can produce a good instrument first time if you have little wood-working experience. So I'll be assuming that you know some stuff. I won't be talking about how to tune a hand-plane or how to use a chisel. There's plenty of information on out there that cover that anyway. I'll be explaining how I prefer to do things. I don't claim that I know the only way to build a guitar or that I know the best way. What I will be describing is how I choose to do things and you may prefer to do things differently. Don't expect this to be a totally comprehensive tutorial. If you have any question please ask and I'll do my best to help you but I can't build the instrument for you. Be resourceful and read widely on the subject. There is lots of information out there and you'll need to buy some books on the subject. There is lots of great information on youtube and in forums but there is no substitute for a good book written by a master. I still consult books that I bought 25 years ago and every lutherie and woodwork book I have bought was worth the money. New books come out with new information as well. There is always more to learn. The first thing you will need is some decent wood. If you are prepared to do a bit of work preparing the wood you won't need to spend lots on tone-wood. Curly Maple and AAAA-grade Adirondack Spruce look and sound fantastic but they are also very expensive. I'll be showing the use of "budget" timber and hopefully show that you can still produce a good instrument from these materials. First step: Making the neck I bought a Mahogany board from a woodworking show many years ago and decided to use it to make a neck. The plank is too thin to make a solid neck so I decided to make a laminated neck. So I mounted the board in my Black-and-Decker workmate. A little while ago i bought a Japanese-style hand-saw and it proved great for sawing up the board. It's a handy device; one side is for cross-cutting, the other for ripping. It does cross-cut faster than it rips however.

Hand-sawing is time consuming and if you have a band saw it will make the job quicker. However I prefer to do things the old-fashioned way. Remember, Stradavari and Guaneri had no power tools!

Prologue to a life as a part-time Luthier

It was a long time ago but I remember coming across Melvyn Hiscock's book Make Your Own Electric Guitar (I can't remember where) and felt inspired to give it a go. Little did I know that it would take me on a long journey of discovery. I lusted after the fine vintage instruments that were used to make classic recordings but not being able to afford one of these I thought I could try building one similar. After all, they're just wood and wire and magnets I naively believed. I had no woodworking experience and I had many obstacles to overcome. Not least being a lack of the necessary tools. I did have access to a workshop and some machine tools such as a Drill Press but I had no idea how many specialist tools I would end up needing to buy or make. I've never been well-off financially so the odds were stacked against me. What I learned was how to be resourceful both with tools, materials and techniques and this is something that still challenges me. That is, how to make the best of what I have. It's an important skill to learn and it can only be cultivated by effort and persistence and letting go of the fear of making mistakes. Easier said than done, of course. I've never been one to take the easy route in life. Life should be an adventure and that's how I've always tried to see it. I owned an electric guitar, a Japanese Les Paul copy retro-fitted with Fender and Schaller humbucking pickups. Through my amp (a Guyatone Zip 60) it sounded muddy and indistinct, to my ears anyway. So i dismantled the instrument, which fortunately had a bolt-on neck. I sawed off the fingerboard with a hand-saw and removed the truss rod. I made up a neck from a scrap piece of Jarrah and fashioned a body out of another slab of Jarrah. This made for a seriously weighty guitar! I made a fingerboard from a piece of Jarrah and cut the fret slots with an old Tenon Saw. I expoxied in frets I cut from lengths of fencing wire. It sounds very crude I know, but not knowing any better, that's what I did. I installed the pickups and wiring loom from the old guitar into hand-chiseled cavities. The Jarrah transformed the sound. Suddenly the guitar sounded crystal-clear with sparkling highs and a deep round bass. The thing looked terrible and the neck was way to thick but the sound blew me away. I was hooked and just wanted to do more and more building. More soon...