Bending the sides

20150722
I began to bend the sides.
Nothing too different from what I did previously except for the new mould.
Anyway the bending process is using my heat pipe powered by the heat gun and bend with hands and 2 small blocks of wood.
After the sides are bent, I place them in the mould.
Using the centre lines of the mould I marked and cut the ends.

After that I prepared the end blocks too.
A single end block blank can be used for 2 guitars but cutting into 1/2

Bending set-up with heat pipe heat gun.

One side bent

Cutting the ends.

Both sides bent.

Sawing the end block into 1/2

Saw tracking nicely.

Done. For the upper bout I use clamp to spread out the sides.

Thickness the sides

I also thickness the maple sides for #8.
The sequence of thicknessing is scrub plane, my wooden plane and finally high angle plane.
After removing the initial layer of maple I can see the beautiful flame figure.
Maple does not really likes to be planed, I have to plane at an angle to avoid tearout.
But the HA plane is really doing a good job of levelling it smooth without tearout.

Straightening one side of the sides for the top facing edge.

Began planing. You can see the flame figure after removing the initial oxidized layer.

Sequence of planing Scrub -> Wooden Smoother -> HA plane

Done!

Look at the waste shavings / chips.

20150705
The sides are saw to size.
Some binding can be made from the cut-off of the sides.

Cutting off some excess from the sides. It can be used as bindings.

Cut-off done.

Thickness the sides

20150526
I began to thickness the sides.
Originally I plan to braced up the top but due the recent wet weather I decided to postpone that step.
Thicknessing the sides is pretty straight forward, I did it with these planes:
- scrub plane - remove main bulk of material in chips
- #5 jack plane - to smoothen the ridges form by the scrub
- HA smooth woodie - to further smoothen the surface.
If I follow this scheme of removal the thicknessing is pretty straight forward.
But it still takes a great deal of effort.
I was left panting all the way.
Guess I am really out of shape ... haha.

Plane one edge straight first (top edge)

Scrape the outside face smooth

Planing starts...

Look at the amount of waste produced...

Sides thickenessed. You can really feel that it's very pliable. Now it's ready to be bent.

20150529
Final smoothening of the surface before bending using scraper.
Also to ensure both sides are same thickness at the same point.
This is especially crucial at the butt or end block region.

Final smoothening using scraper and also ensure the 2 sides are same thickness at the same region especially at the end block region.

20150705
The sides are saw to size.
Some binding can be made from the cut-off of the sides.

Cutting off some excess from the sides. It can be used as bindings.

Sawing off the excess