The bad and the ugly

Ok, I'm going where most don't go...show you the flaws. Well, not all of them, only the ones I'm going to fix up a bit. The rest are "character". First up is the purfling that got carved through. I vowed not to do that again, but here it is. I need to make sure my platform around the edge is level, then make sure the channel is cut to the same depth. A dremel tool would probably help here, but I'm against it, at least while I don't have one.



Next is the split wood on the inside of the f holes. Never had that problem before, Englemann cuts pretty easy. This red spruce is a lot stronger and stringier. I did buy a Japanese blue steel knife as suggested by Michael Darnton on maestronet. I just used it to trim the holes up to size, the damage was already done. It cuts real nice, but that is no surprise, my 1" blue steel gouge is a workhorse. One thing I've noticed is knives (all cutting tools for that matter) seem to work better when slid in more than one direction at a time. Don't know how else to explain that, but if you try, you will feel the difference. Maybe the knife will make a difference on the next one.





Finally the rib break. Don't know how it happened. I'm guessing when I planed the top of the ribs after the linings were glued on. Maybe it had a slight crack, and the glue job must have been mediocre. I never like doing planing the ribs. It is so easy to cut more off the ribs than at the blocks. I did have a lot of trouble bending this maple. Nothing else I've used had this much flame. The birch has a nasty deep flame in it, but they are further apart and didn't seem to be as much of a problem. They weren't quartered either, maybe that helped. I'll try to get a piece to match the flame there. It shouldn't be that hard to fix.


Errors are inevitable, but they cut into your time. Fixing things always takes longer than doing it right the first time. At least these things are fixable. It is the same way with the rest of your life. Doing the right thing may seem harder at the time, but will always turn out better than going down the other path. But as soon as you realize you're on the wrong one, stop and get off! The longer you are on the wrong road the more backtracking you will have to do to get back on the right one. Even major errors in life are fixable, but only through Jesus. He's not a magic eraser, but He is the only way your errors can be forgiven. That is the truth, and the word in my title that is missing...the good.

Balance

Balance is something that isn't a big subject on violin forums. Varnish, grounds, purling, f-holes, all get attention. Balance is a side subject. I think I've seen more comments about balance when it comes to violas. They are a trickier beast. By putting your left arm out further the viola suddenly gets heavier. We pull parts and tools off the machines sometimes at work that are hotter than we expected....they get heavy fast too! Some luthiers have suggested carving the back and belly until it balances on a certain point. I think that some move the neck step to 10mm, or more on violas mostly to get a different (better?) balance point while it is being played. I balance and tune fingerboards and tailpieces, unless I forget that I didn't and plunge forward on the next step. What's the point of balancing and tuning them? I don't know. It just came to my head one day, it was doable, so I did it. Many times I get ideas in my head and I do them if I can. Songs and poems come that way. If you don't do it then, it may not get done. Balancing and tuning seem to go together on fingerboards and tailpieces. By some odd twist of fate (sure) the fingerboard is half attached to the neck, and half cantilevered over the belly. I found that they can be balanced and tuned. Do they sound better? I don't know. Tailpieces are the same way. I found that out when I made my first one. It was a baroque wedge shaped one. I found while drawing it up, the area was the same at the ends, and stayed about the same area equidistant from the center. Most modern tailpieces are heavier on the bottom half. The one I just made I balanced, but forgot to tune. It is a bit heavier than I would have liked, but I'll see how it does. The photo shows 2 store bought, and 2 homemade tailpieces. I like the inlaid one for my tiny 1666 Strad, but it is more work. I'm thinking that I need to make the fittings beforehand. When things get almost done I get too antsy to be playing around making stuff. Balance is always supposed to be a good thing. But on some things in life you don't want balance. You just need to have a one track mindset. Place your life in the hands of Jesus and let him lead your life. That is one thing you don't need to balance out.

Let it go

I wanted to use yellowheart as an accent wood on the fittings. I tried, and tried, and tried. It won't work. It is too splintery. Drop back and punt. The buttery smooth rosewood is the backup plan. Get over it. The photo shows the offending piece out of rosewood that I just couldn't make out of yellowheart. It also shows what my ground will look like.



I shot one photo from the top down, the other from the bottom up, to tried to show the flame. I have my ground all figured out. A coat or two of wattery gum. A coat of liquid resin to seal. Then a coat of varnish to put some color on it. The varnish is quite dark, but I don't remember what it was. There is kind of a label on it, but I don't understand my abbreviations! I will use Joe's varnish on the real one, just haven't ordered it yet. I have some oopsies to fix before I can seal the plates up. A couple spots I carved right through the purfling...oops. One piece of the ribs in the corner broke off...oops. The underside of the f holes is splintered in spots...oops. Oops seems to be the word of the day. I'm not perfect. Nobody is. Only one man ever was. He gave his life for ours. Won't you give yours for him?

Same thing again!

I know you've been there. Seems like day after day you do the same thing, but nothing ever gets accomplished. I haven't worked more than 20 minutes or so any day on violin stuff. It seems like I've worked on it more, but I haven't. Anyway, I've done some things. I have the tailpiece ready for the little ridge thing. Don't know what it is called. I don't think it is really called a little ridge thing. I started cutting out 4 different ones and two broke. One is still ok, and this yellowheart piece still needs some saw work. The other is a nice creamy textured rosewood. But I had in my mind trying something different, yellowheart on ebony. If I snap this one off I guess it will be rosewood instead. Tomorrow I'll put the little ridge thing in.
The other thing I've played around with is the ground sample. My other grounds were thinned varnish, or water based, casien mixed with other stuff I don't even remember! Seemed too thick and blocked the clarity of the grain. These are better. I put a thin coat of oil varnish over them and they look good. You can see the four different grounds, separated by a space of bare wood. The varnish on the bare wood looks almost yellow, the grounded areas are more like different shades of cardboard. The wood sample isn't uniform enough to get a direct comparison, but they all seemed to keep the varnish from soaking into the wood. I shared my ground recipes with varnish guru Joe Robson (violinvarnish.com) and he remarked "What was I thinking?" That means he was impressed, right? Well a statement like that is perfect for someone with the motto "why be normal". I almost have the belly tuned up. Once it is done, I may put a ground coat on it then check the tuning again. I don't know if it will change, but some makers have said that it will. We'll see.

going slow

Well, I've started the tailpiece finally today. I have the top radius finished. Did it mainly with a flat plane blade used as a scraper. The profile is cut, but isn't perfect yet, done with a coping saw and half round file. The underside is roughed out with my 1" blue steel gouge. The holes are drilled in the end for the tailgut, done with a hand drill and .088" bit. No not an electric hand drill, the kind you turn with your right hand like a hand egg beater, remember those? Not unless you're as old as me, or work in a museum. I guess I better not say too much more about that until I carve away the underside where the nuts will go and make sure the holes were straight! I played around with some ground applications since it is getting near the end and I may want to try sealing the wood before I finish the tuning up. To early to tell how that turned out. Anyway, secret grounds and varnish are the key to a great instrument.

I wrote a poem a couple days ago and it was talking about believing in God just by belief, not reason, and doing what He says by faith in the outcome, not what you think. In other words take the Bible at it's word. I had a dream about the same thing last night. The point in the dream was not to just believe the things you like in the bible and gloss over the hard parts. Things would never get done if people always skipped the hard parts on their jobs. Cars wouldn't get built, space travel wouldn't happen, doctors would never become doctors, Gods work wouldn't get done. The message was reiterated in one of the books I read this morning (not the WHOLE books!) Loving God, by Charles Colson. He related a story where a friend had glossed over parts in the bible that said it was his job to help people, defend the defenseless, right injustice, etc. It's easy to say that you are good and nice, much harder to get involved. Don't know where I'm going to be called, but with all these things coming together I'll have to keep my eyes open. Sometimes things you could do are subtle. Sometimes they hit you like a brick.