Couple of woodworking questions...

DartmoorHedgehog

A couple of questions that I'm sure somebody on here can answer...
Slightly off-topic because what I'm making isn't a guitar (actually a solid-bodied violin), but the general techniques should be relevant...

Firstly, I have a ready-made ebony fingerboard that I want thinning down a bit.  It's curved on the top so I want the thickness taken from the back.  This is a pretty scary thought with my available hand tools - is this the sort of thing that's doable by somebody with a thickness planer or the like?  Bear in mind the sides are not parallel and the top face is curved.

Second question: I've only ever made guitar necks out of mahogany, roughly shaped with angle grinder and files then finished with a scraper.  Violin necks are usually maple, but the only maple I've had before was some I had for an acoustic guitar bridge plate and it was seriously hard.  If I buy a bit of maple for the neck will I regret it, bearing in mind I've only got pretty basic tools?

VimFuego

I've never worked seasoned maple (I mostly do "green" woodworking) but the UK maple I've worked green has been very easy to work with hand tools. But then I've not worked other varieties, so they may be different.

DartmoorHedgehog

VimFuego said:

I've never worked seasoned maple (I mostly do "green" woodworking) but the UK maple I've worked green has been very easy to work with hand tools. But then I've not worked other varieties, so they may be different.

OK thanks.  I'd guess it would have to be seasoned for this purpose to avoid warping wouldn't it?  The bit I've had before for the bridge plate was the hardest substance known to man - cutting with a saw wasn't too bad (it was only a few mm thick) but I'm not sure how my dodgy stanley blade scraper would cope (I could always get a slightly better one but don't want to end up buying loads of tools I won't use much).

VimFuego

I would assume it must be seasoned yeah. I can only assume the maple you had wasn't the species we have in this country, as I used some of it as firewood and even seasoned I could split it easily enough with a knife etc.

DartmoorHedgehog

VimFuego said:

I would assume it must be seasoned yeah. I can only assume the maple you had wasn't the species we have in this country, as I used some of it as firewood and even seasoned I could split it easily enough with a knife etc.

I don't know exactly what it was - I bought it from David Dyke I think, just a small bit along with some other stuff I bought when I was making an acoustic top.  Sure it was some sort of maple.  Ridiculously hard it was!

VimFuego

interesting, I don't know much about non uk species of woods, I wonder if it was rock maple, that certainly sounds like it should be hard.

Kalimna

To reduce the thickness of your ebony board might be tricky. To use a thickness planer, you would need to construct a rigid jig/cradle to hold the board. It would also be pretty easy to end up taking more off one side than the other. If you are unfamilliar (relatively) with woodworking then i might try a different solution.
Maple isnt much worse than mahogany, just harder so it takes longer to carve. I would suggest using rasps rather than an angle grinder though. At least with a violin neck.

Adam

WezV

I am not familiar with how violin fingerboard blanks are provided, but if you have some pics of its current and proposed state we may be able to help more


Maples carve really well, but they can be hard going.   you need the tools sharp.   Violins would have traditionally used european sycamore...  a bit easier going than the maples often used in modern guitar luthiery

DartmoorHedgehog

Thanks @Kalimna ;
Violin necks are pretty small so at least I won't have so much wood to remove - I agree the angle grinder is a bit overkill in this case, but is useful for roughly shaping a guitar neck.

The board is going to be a pain I think.  It's a viola board to get the width (because it's going to be a 5-string violin) but is a lot thicker than I really need for the violin - it's about 12mm thick, so more than half the entire neck thickness.  If there's no safe way to thin it down I'll just use it as-is, but the maple part of the neck will have to be quite thin.  Should work fine structurally I think once it's glued together but will just look a bit strange.

WezV

actually, a quick look online suggests you will need to remove wood from the top surface of the board... not the bottom - depending how prepared it is

https://trianglestrings.com/newfingerboard/

There will be jigs you could rig up to do that, but getting familiar with the handplane would be much  quicker.  

DartmoorHedgehog

Thanks @WezV ;
The board is ready-finished but just a bit thick (because it's a viola board as I mentioned to kalimna).  I'm being awkward building something weird, as usual

I'll post some pictures later when I'm at home.  It looks like a very difficult thing to hold still while cutting or planing, not something I think I'd tackle myself but if it was doable with some sort of cunning machinery I'd be prepared to pay a few quid to have it done.

octatonic

Ebony fingerboard:  if doing it by hand then I'd make a fingerboard support that had the radius of the ebony fingerboard on it to sit in.
It wouldn't need to be exact but you don't want the ebony board flexing a you plane/sand it down.

Same basically goes with a drum sander but I'd probably do this by hand- it is a fairly small surface area and you can be fairly precise with a sharp plane.

OR (and this is how I would do it if you haven't done much inlay work yet) just use a radius block and take it down from the fingerboard side.
I would make a guide for the radius block (just two piece of wood the length of the fingerboard and place the fingerboard between them.
Have you checked the fingerboard for flatness on the gluing face?

Necks: I shape my necks with Herdim rasps. They are the best tool for the job. Buy some- they are not expensive. I got mine from Dictum.

DartmoorHedgehog

I can't get that link to work @WezV but mine is a finished board, bit like this one http://www.stewmac.com/Materials_and_Supplies/Bodies_and_Necks_and_Wood/Violin_and_Fiddle_Wood/Shaped_Violin_Fingerboard.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=shopping&utm_campaign=2017-05-gp&pref_currency=P&shipcalc=UK&gclid=CLCdz9XV0dMCFUm37QodZysBXA

Kalimna

If you are going down the 'removing wood from the radiused side' route, then may I suggest using a piece of wood slightly narrower than the thinnest width of the blank, that is longer and has this face flat. Use double sided tape to fix the blank to this piece of wood, with the edges slightly overhanging. This piece of wood can then be clamped to a workbench and provides a rigid way of holding an awkward piece of ebony. You may then use radius blocks (or plain sanding blocks) to take the surface down as needed. I am not familiar with violin finger boards, but I suspect they have a constantly changing radius, which will make the use of radius blocks a bit more awkward.

I am lucky enough to have an Auriou rasp and a couple of Liogier rasps, which make short work of maple, mahogany, rosewood and padouk so far.

Adam

DartmoorHedgehog

Thanks again folks. 

@octatonic I reckon making a radiused cradle to hold the board would be possible, but pretty difficult with my available kit.  If I cut the curved side instead I'm not sure the radius is constant, like @Kalimna suspects - I'd have to check.  When I did a guitar fretboard last year I made a radius block by sticking abrasive paper to a big oil drum and rubbing a block of wood against it, but if the violin board is compound radius it's not such an attractive prospect.  

Those rasps look nice but I think €100 a piece is a bit out of my range for seldom-used tools.  If I was doing this sort of thing regularly then I totally agree with using the best tool for the job to make things easier.

I haven't actually checked the back for flatness accurately yet but I suspect it's pretty good - or at least nothing that can't be sorted by rubbing on abrasive on a flat surface

@kalimna I used the sticking down with double sided tape method when I made the guitar board.  Worked pretty well for fret slotting and radiusing.  Trouble is I could do with taking about 4mm off this viola board...

Of course, another option is just to leave it the thickness it is.  It'll work perfectly well, just means the neck will be half ebony rather than about 1/3 ebony on my daughter's normal violin.  It's not going to be a normal violin anyway...

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'll think about it and see how it goes.  I'll post a build thread in "other instruments" or somewhere when I'm at that stage if anybody's interested.

DartmoorHedgehog

@WezV ;
That link you posted is working for me now.  Interesting page, thanks - I hadn't seen that before.  Looks like it's normal to take some off _both_ sides.  Perhaps I'll look into buying a couple of better scrapers and/or planes and doing it that way.  I don't want to put too much money into specialist tools for stuff I may never to again, but some curved scrapers and planes may be useful again - and I suppose I could always sell stuff on afterwards if I think I'll never use it.

octatonic

DartmoorHedgehog said:

Thanks again folks. 

@octatonic I reckon making a radiused cradle to hold the board would be possible, but pretty difficult with my available kit.  If I cut the curved side instead I'm not sure the radius is constant, like @Kalimna suspects - I'd have to check.  When I did a guitar fretboard last year I made a radius block by sticking abrasive paper to a big oil drum and rubbing a block of wood against it, but if the violin board is compound radius it's not such an attractive prospect.  

Those rasps look nice but I think €100 a piece is a bit out of my range for seldom-used tools.  If I was doing this sort of thing regularly then I totally agree with using the best tool for the job to make things easier.

I haven't actually checked the back for flatness accurately yet but I suspect it's pretty good - or at least nothing that can't be sorted by rubbing on abrasive on a flat surface

@kalimna I used the sticking down with double sided tape method when I made the guitar board.  Worked pretty well for fret slotting and radiusing.  Trouble is I could do with taking about 4mm off this viola board...

Of course, another option is just to leave it the thickness it is.  It'll work perfectly well, just means the neck will be half ebony rather than about 1/3 ebony on my daughter's normal violin.  It's not going to be a normal violin anyway...

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'll think about it and see how it goes.  I'll post a build thread in "other instruments" or somewhere when I'm at that stage if anybody's interested.

Hi, 

They aren't 100 euro, only the high cut value ones are.
You don't need those- a Cut 5 would be perfectly fine for 90% of the work,

Like this: LINKY
43 euro.

DartmoorHedgehog

octatonic said:

They aren't 100 euro, only the high cut value ones are.
You don't need those- a Cut 5 would be perfectly fine for 90% of the work,

Like this: LINKY
43 euro.

Ah, fair enough.

octatonic

There are very few tools that I can recommend without reservation but these are they.

They come without handles but you can get those from Axminster for a fiver or so.