Acoustic Guitar Construction

I wanted to share a new little hobby with you all. I've made some wooden hand planes, 3 so far.
I have some pictures of two of them.
The little guy is 3" long and about an inch wide. It is for carving braces primarily. The inside wood is Honduras Rosewood, I think and the sides are hard maple. The pin is stainless, 3/16". The iron is a 1/2" chisel blade, and the wedge is sapele. I set the iron at 40 degrees and it sharpened to a 25 degree angle, typical chisel angle. It cuts REALLY WELL.

The bigger one is is about 5" long and has a 3/4" iron/chisel blade. It is set at a 45 degree angle. The inside wood is Cocobolo and the sides are stabilized Pecan. It also cuts really well.

The third one I made and gave away was about 5 1/2" long and also used the 3/4" chisel. I used Cocobolo and hard maple on that one, it was basically the same shape as the larger one here.

These are simple, and a blast to make. I bought cheap chisels at HF and cut them off the handles. I have alot of Cocobolo blocks I can use which seems to be a perfect wood for these, and I want to get a small supply of some various exotic hardwoods and do some neat looking combinations of woods and make a few more. I basically combined two different ideas/plans to make these.

You can use just about any hardwood. I recommend giving it a try for some custom shaped cutter for your guitar work!

Kevin

What a cool project. What plans did you base these from?

Really neat and they actually don't look that hard to make. So I'm sure I could screw it up:)

Well I combined two ways of doing it. One plan is in a woodworking magazine, can't think which one right now, the other I got off the net.
Very simple. Angle for the iron bed is 45 degrees. The other side is about 60 degrees (not critical). The mouth is 1/8" to 3/16" open...make it smaller and file it for a custom fit. The pin placement is based on the thickness of your iron and about a same thickness for the wedge. Width of the inside blocks is a 1/16" over the width of the iron. I don't think it matters what size pin you use, even a wood dowel will work here. Use your scrap wood and play around with it. Take an old yard sale chisel or buy a cheap set (HF set of 4 for about $4.50). I used a cut off grinding wheel to cut the blade to length.
Glue it up, shape it how ever you want.
If you all want I can make copies and post the plans I used.

Kevin

Da planes are very nice!

Would love to try it, please post them!

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