Binding the Guitar

So it is about that time to start one of the most beautiful and enjoyable experiences of building a guitar. That is binding the guitar. Binding is used as both an aesthetic piece of the guitar and also to help strengthen the joints of the box. Lastly, it is used to make sure that no gaps between the guitar top/back and sides are visible. For this guitar I have decided to use Indian rosewood, similar to the back strip, and the butt strip. 

The first thing that we needed to do was to route out the binding ledge. This is done with a bushing on the router bit to make sure that the cut is perfect for the entire spot. The picture to the left shows an in-action photo of the binding ledge being cut for the top. We additionally have to cut a ledge for the purfling. This is usually strips of wood that will be added to the top or the back of the guitar that help to offset the binding from the top. For this guitar, I am using fine herringbone, which was used on the Martin guitar that I am following, and also on my original classical guitar that I built. You will see pictures below of the purfling. 

Once the ledges have been cut, it is ready to start fitting getting the binding set to be fit into the ledges. First we have to go back to the bending iron. This is done so that the rosewood does not break as we force it into the ledges. The one lucky thing is that rosewood is very easy to bend. Therefore, this was an easy task. When I was building my classical, I used ebony, which can be very brittle. We had a few cracks that were kind of a major problem later on in the build. But this did not happen during this build.

Once bent, it was time to begin forming the binding to the sides. This consisted of double checking to make sure the bends were in the correct place. Additionally, it was important that we were able to miter the edges of the binding to the butt strip and the back strip.

 To the left, you can see one of the many phase of fitting the binding. We used masking tape to keep the waist in place. This is a relatively time consuming process because you have to be very much a stickler to make sure everything is perfect.


Since the herringbone is a relatively thick strip, we had to make sure that it wouldn't crack when we placed it in the ledge. Therefore, we had to "bend" it by wetting it down and taping it into a form.

Once bent, I first began by gluing in the herringbone. After letting that set up, it was time to glue up the actual rosewood to the guitar. This is done one side at a time.


To the right, you can see the final product of the glue up. We made sure that the binding and and the purfling were a little proud of the top. This was done to make sure that we could clean everything up with out burning through the top of the guitar.

I next began working on the back. Again, I worked a great deal to make sure that the binding was perfectly fitting on the ledge. For the back, we added one piece of white laminate to offset the binding and the Koa.

Therefore, we glued in this piece first, once it fit perfectly. After letting that set up, we glued up the back binding.

To the right, you can see the final product again. It looks kind of strange with all the tape, but once it is cleaned up, it will look great.

Once everything was all set and the glue was all dried up. It was time to take down the binding on both the sides and the top and the back. This was done using scrapers, hand planes and sand paper. It is relatively quick work. But you have to be careful, because you can burn through the binding very quickly.

The below pictures are some that I snapped once everything was all finished.

The picture to the right and left and the first one below, show the top with a little bit of naptha on it. We just wanted to see how the guitar would look once finished. As you can tell, it looks pretty darn good. The one good thing that we had were no gaps, which tends to happen during the binding process.

 The picture to the left just has a detail picture of the meeting place of the bindings. You can see that the herringbone perfectly meets in the center.

On the right, you can see the back of the guitar, with a very nice miter into the back strip.

Lastly, below, we have the top in how it looks right now (before finishing)

 Next we will be working on the fingerboard and the neck. I will get back to you in the next few days. Enjoy!

Building the Box

 One thing that needed to be done was to glue up a bridge plate. This is a piece of rosewood that will be directly under the bridge. This helps to ad stability to the top and help to keep the load of approximately 120 lbs of force from the strings, without the top caving in. The picture to the right shows what Dan and I liked to call our "ghetto" glue up, because we had to add a few shims in place to keep the joint perfect.

So, the sides are all set, the back is all set and the top/neck is all set. It is now time to start putting the whole thing together. There are numerous ways in which to create the sound box of the guitar. One such way is to just clamp everything together with some glue and you have it. Though it is quick and easy, it is very stressful and also can become very difficult. One way that this glue up has been done in the past is by using something called a tantellone. This is basically a small piece of wood that acts as a shelf between the top and the side of the guitar. each piece of wood is glued individually so that the joint is very strong with no added pressure on the joint. We use something called hide glue. This glue is made from animal hide and needs to be heated up so that it is liquid. When the glue cools, it will begin to tack up. Typically this takes just a minute or two.

This is a way that many luthiers have glued the top to the sides. But it is very time consuming. Every tantellone needs to be held in place for about 45 seconds so that it doesn't drift and so that it is in the correct place. Using some good old fashioned wood glue, I glue up the butt-block (a piece of mahogany that is the point where the two sides meet). I then glue in one side to the neck block and then to the butt-block. I let this sit for a few minutes just to tack up. Using some additional clamps, I was able to keep the sides in the perfect position and then I begin the tatelloning phase.

 This process took around 90 minutes per side because there were so many tatellones to be placed. In the picture above, you can see how each piece has been placed. I fist put pieces on the braces, and then just surrounding the braces. Then each other tantellone was put on in kind of a random order. The picture to the right shows the second side being glued up and tacking up so that the tantelloning can begin on that side. I completed this entire process in one day and to be honest with you, it was a very long one. For both my uke and the classical guitar, I completed this as well, and honestly I do have to say I enjoy the process. It is a very soothing job as you don't really have to think while doing it (not many people like this type of thing).

So I continue this process, which took somewhere near 3 hours to complete and finally the top and the sides are all glued up. We let this sit over night so that the glue will completely harden - even though it did so while I was completing the tanelloning phase.

The next day, the excess wood from the top was then cut off and I was ready to get the back put on. What I did first, was just double check that all the excess glue was not visible and tried to clean up the top, back and sides as best as I could. Just so it wouldn't be visible through the soundhole.

The back is glued up by using the kerfing that I had already installed on the sides. I first needed to make sure the sides were completely perfect, by flattening them out and making sure the sides were identical in width. Once this was set, it was time to notch out the sides so that I could clip in the back in the perfect place. This was completed with a small saw and a 1/8 inch chisel. To the right, you can see a detailed view of the notch that was taken out. Since there are three braces, this had to be done six times. Once all were completed, we could now see if everything was all set and ready to be glued.

The picture to the left was taken right after final fit up. To make sure that everything was perfect, a few files were used to make sure the back would be flush to the sides.

One last double check of everything, and we were all set to glue up the back to the rest of the guitar.

However, there was one final thing to be done to the inside of the guitar. You have to make sure that you mark your guitar so that everyone knows who produced it. You can see in the picture to the right my signature that I put on the top of the guitar just prior to gluing up. Hopefully, no one will ever see this again as we hope the guitar will stay in tack for the long term. 

Finally, it was time to just do a mock glue up (meaning there was no glue used whatsoever). You can see the spool clamps that were used to put an even amount of pressure down on the back to make sure the back glued up correctly.

 Once we realized that it was all set, some glue was applied to the kerfing and then we clamped everything up. There was a little squeeze out, which is a very good thing. This means that there was some glue that was pressed out of the joint. This usually means that you have a good joint and glue was applied to all points of contact. This was then let to sit again overnight, so the glue could really tack up. The excess wood from the back was then removed and we had the sound box all set and ready to go.

Now it is on to doing one of the things that luthiers do to add some flash to the guitar. Binding is placed in all the locations where a joint is visible on the sound box. I first started by routing out a channel for the butt-strip. This is the joint where the two sides meet. For this guitar I am using a lot of Indian Rosewood appointments with some white laminate to offset it from the Koa wood.

To route the channel. a piece of plywood was double-stick taped to the butt of the guitar and a 1/4 in router bit cut the channel so that the remaining piece of the back strip could be used.

A small bead of glue was then applied in the channel and the strip of rosewood was then pressed in.

In the picture to the right, you can see the glued in strip with a little bit of squeeze out. This will all be flushed down to the sides once the glue is all dry. The next thing to do will be to work on the actual binding of the guitar and to start work on the fingerboard. This will come in the next week or so as I will not be able to make it into the mill until after the Easter holiday.  But for now, you can just picture the guitar with that rosewood applied to the edges of the entire sound box.