A new OM about to be born

[Kevin in California]

This one I'll start in a week or two.
An OM of East Indian Rosewood one of the sets I brought back from India in 2014.
AA Sitka spruce top.
Abalone rosette
Super curly Koa ( thank you Bob) with abalone top purfling and BWB back purfling.
Saplele neck with bolt down fretboard extension support
Indian rosewood fretboard and bridge, also blanks I brought back from India
Black African ebony headplate
Curly Koa backstrap and end wedge.
Gold frets and gold Taylor tuners.
There will be a pickup but the owner is going to pick that and send it to me.
This one will be going to India next summer!
He wants a cutaway but don't want to do it with Curly Koa bindings. I just know they'll break on the iron....
So builders peragative....it will probably not be a cutaway

[Herman]

NICE!

[John Parchem]

Cool, I am starting an OM very soon.

[Kevin in California]

I realized on my last build, an OM that I've been using a 25.4 scale length on them.....all 5 so far. That is what I also used on all the Dreds I've made.
I looked at the plans I have for a Martin type OM and it calls for 24.9 scale.
Interesting that I started out using the Kincade book when I did....at least....my first OM and he uses the 25.4.
I did my top bracing based on HIS plans. At some point I started doing the brace layout according to the Martin style (Antes) plans but kept using the 25.4 scale length.
I have not had any negative issues that I've noticed thus far. I guess my X brace and bridge plate locations have worked out okay.

Anyone see any problems with what I've been doing?
I will lay out both sets of plans and compare. Maybe they are the same???

Just thought I'd share this. Mixing two sets of plans might not be a good idea.
I don't even remember which one I used to make my mold and bending form from. GOOD GRIEF!
I'll check it out and report back tomorrow. The shop is 102 degrees right now so I'm in the house in my chair drinking an ice coffee this afternoon.

[Will Reyer]

Kevin,

I don't think you're doing anything wrong at all; what I've seen of your work looks like anything but wrong.

Interesting, you started with the Kinkead book. I did too, basically used his placements tweaked to fit the silhouette of my Sant Cruz OM. Did also basically manage to misplace Kinkead's X-brace location for a couple and they play all right regardless.

The SC, the Kinkead, and the Martin silhouettes are all pretty close. My (actual) luthier friend here, Kjell, told me the Martin 000 and the OM are the same body, but the OM uses their long scale and the 000 is the short. The Martin built for Norman Blake was the short scale 000 with the body join moved from 14th to 12th fret.

I'm working on my second of those but a variation using the long scale, as I had a machinist friend notch me a piece of 6061-T6 to make a fixture to use with a sled for slotting fretboards. I had the fixture built to an actual 25.4" scale, and then I read somewhere that that's really Martin's nominal scale, they actually use 25.34" or something, but oh well...

[Kevin in California]

Yes apparently the actual measurement is just shy of 25.4 but interesting it's usually called that

[peter havriluk]

Once I was in a forum conversation with Ken Cierpolowski about Martin's scale length, and they are ambiguous. Long scale was 25.34" except when it was 25.4", both conversationally and interchangeably called 25.4". Same for short scale, 24.82"/24.9". Memories are unreliable things, but I think Ken sold fretting templatres for all four of these I mentioned.