Acoustic Guitar Construction

I rebuild a Johnson resonator with a busted neck, doweled neck joint. I replaced it with a Martin 2nd that was mortise and tendon and set it up for fingerpicking not slide. I was lucky and got the neck angle right after one try because to work on it required removing the resonator with its numerous screws to get to the attachment bolts.
Beautiful work you got there, Herman.

Ah, Herman, exquisite as usual. I admire your glue-up for a neck blank. I always use a center, contrasting color stripe a quarter-inch wide. The groove I need to rout for a double-action truss rod is this width, and it makes for easy centering. I do like the thin grace of yours, though.

I expect you need not worry about the soundboard thickness. You could use .25" Masonite and it wouldn't probably make much difference, as it's the spun aluminum cone that makes the noise in a resonator. And yeah, for sure, make me a sound file.

When you get it tuned up to concert pitch, if you lived across the pond in the Frozen North Midwest Rust Belt, you would probably reach into your mechanics socket wrench drawer for a long 13/16" spark plug socket to use as a slide. In reality this just probably indicates my advanced senility as even in 'Murika now our domestic cars use metrics, hah!

Carl and Will, thanks.
They use metrics in the US? And that now after 20 years I'm a bit used to the imperials. Except the fractions. They always seemed odd to me.

Here the progress:
The parts are ready in the rough. Now fine sanding and filling. As you can see the insert nuts (over here "rampa nuts") are in the neck.
Maybe this could be the first dovetail bolt-on neck in the world

This time I tried another filler, 'cause I found none of the available fillers 100% satisfying.
So "Rustins wood filler mahogany" now. It fills nice, dries fast and sands easy. It did cover quite well in one pass. Drawback this time: A bit too red for my taste and despite covering with shellac, the maple parts took some color.
For me Zpoxy resin is still a winner. It has one drawback. After filling you need to sand it meticulous down to the wood all over, or you leave a complete layer on the surface before finishing. Otherwise it tends to be visable blotchy.

Here the looks after filling with Rustins and one pass of Tung Oil wiped finish:





Looking at the neck funny thoughts come by. Imagining it was carrying loads of churchgoers over hundreds of years, and now it's going to bear 200 pounds of stringload over next the years. No wonder it is so tough to work on. Kind of the Atlas mythology. Would that make me a kind of Heracles/Hercules? (He took the burdon, carrying the skies, from Atlas for a little while. But he tricked Atlas to take it back.)

Neck was bolted on. Fitted just right as the fingerboard extension does. No glue needed. Easy as all on top is dead flat.
The Rim for cone support needs support from the back. So here I made from 3/8" douwel rod the posts. They just snug fit between the rim and the braces. No force needed. Maybe I will give them a drop of CA glue.



A bit more attention was needed for the line up of the cone, the nut and saddle. This is explained on several sites. But I followed
this Stewmac page. Turns out fine. Before I put on the cover plate, the build is setup for playing to see if all works fine.
I tried a few notes, no rattles, but the technique to play clean notes and chords feels strange and very clumsy to me. Definitely need some lessons.

Wow Herman. Looking great. I have never handled this type of guitar. It must be heavy. Played lap style right?

Yes, heavy. 2730 gram. 6 lbs. Due to the neck and the hardware. And it is meant to be played on the lap. When you play for 50 years in the usual way, then this lap style feels very strange. Like a football player switches to table tennis. Needs some work. HA!