Acoustic Guitar Construction

Ken, as many of you know, has some great ideas on how to work with more precision, so as I work through the KMG Success Kit manual, I'm following his lead closely.

In preparation for doing the top bracing I built the jig mentioned here:
http://kennethmichaelguitars.com/Xbrace ... guide.html
It is noted that this is a left handed version, so I reversed all of the pieces to make a right handed jig.

1/4" Teak plywood was on hand, and worked nicely - I opted for 10-32 brass screw with a knurled brass thumbscrew - why not.

My razor saws are not deep enough to allow me to cut the full joint depth while using the jig - I am able to set an accurate angle, and cut to about 1/3 the final depth. In reality its better to finish the cut outside of the jig to enure absolute focus on the cut depth.

Carefully marking the X brace intersection

Someone told me it takes sharpening your scraper about 20 times before you really start to get the feel for it. Needless to say I have a few more to go.

This photo shows my lousy first attempt at sharpening the scraper, and my starting bridge plate thickness of between .104"-.108"

I was getting some descent rosewood curls off of my bridge plate after another pass at sharpening. Aiming for a final thickness of about .090" - ended up with slight variations between .88"-.092" - tonight I may try to bring down those final high spots just a hair.

Just admiring an evening's work.

I'm pretty pleased with the x brace joint - the angles seem to be right on, and the fit is clean and tight.

Are the photos showing up for everyone?

Photos look fine except some are just way too large -- requiring scrolling

I'll work on scaling them down a little in future posts.