Where to start, where to start? I in MoBilly’s Green Rom that he gave a lesson in guitar. Of course that made me happy, I have a thing for guitars, other musical instruments also. When I was a green pup my buddies put together a band, my brother and I knew some electronics and we proceeded wasting our youth doing things that many here have done. The second band attempt saw two of them and my brother playing the bar circuit in a portion of the Canadian prairies for a few years. Then people grew up and got real jobs. I wanted to play bass and then guitar, never did learn at first because my fingers would always be healing from being cut up due to broken glass at work (occupational hazard). Then they closed the place down and I went back to school and went on a direction in life that, um… …had me going in a different direction.
Then another direction, In this place I had a workmate that was retiring He played guitar and I thought I would put together a practice amplifier (he was looking for one) out of a few bits and pieces from work along with a few things in my tickle trunk (Canadian thing). In the end I did not get it made by the time he retired, he bought himself an amp also. So I decided, what the heck, I’ll just mess around with amplifiers until I get board of it. (I am like a squirrel, “Look over there.”
So fast forward a little and already knowing what I should have made for him) I was looking up the sound of an old Gibson amp on Youtube and afterward I saw on the side a link to a cigar box guitar. Since I heard of them but never heard one I clicked on it. There was this ten year old kid with three strings just wailing away on a stick attached to a cigar box. I thought “Hell, I could make that.” and I did. By this time I had bought a G&L tele so I could hear the amps as I mess with them. Had health issues and ended up spending a lot of time in bed, decided I wanted something acoustic to practice with. Made a chambered guitar, sounded better than I expected and then I thought I would make a real acoustic guitar.
I sent away for some tops, did not want to waste them with mistakes so I built a ‘practice build’ guitar. It was a bit of a long road as I made equipment to help me make the guitar. In the end I got it done, it was just a 16" long body, 22" scale, would really fit as a Parlor guitar now days, back then I had not heard of them yet. The reason it was the size it turned out to be was that I found a cedar board that had the grain quartered (up and down at a 90 degree right angle to the top) and the board was 16" long. It was sold so you could cook your salmon steak on the BBQ.
I was on a forum where some people build guitars, told them what I was going to do and some thought I should be a little less ambitious. It seemed a tall order what I had planned. Basically I wanted to cut my own wood and build everything from scratch. In the end I did it, I did have wrong terns but overcame it all. I ended up building a guitar with pine back and sides (sold as craft wood, it was about 1/4" thick and I did not have to saw wood doen to size). It has a redwood top made out of a fence board (it is quartered but a three piece top. Fir neck and oak fret board. Birch binding and head plate. A not purple piece of purpleheart for the bridge. I welded up a truss rod on top of it.
Bent a few extra side sets.
Makeshift cutting the cedar fence board (a practice piece) on a jury rigged metal band saw.
Making the rosette, the piece of birch from above.
Sort of copied traditional design.
With the back on.
Glued together pieces of fir, with my truss rod.
Bridge.
Finished guitar, it actually sounds pretty good also.
All because of some guy retiring. Funny world, no?