Full size drawing

Well here is my full size drawing. One side is right, the other is only kinda close. Which side do you like? The full size drawing works much better then the 70% scale. You can draw it up so radii end up on points that just happen to be describe radii. I'm happy with the good side (the left one by the way). I had to work today, on a Sunday no less. That I'm not so happy about. I guess I should be grateful, and I am, but you can't get anything done on a violin if you're never home!
I don't have anything else to talk about on the violin. I can say something about my songwriting. Here's the story on how I wrote the first song. I finished reading the local paper. The next to last page has a article written by a local church leader, they switch off week to week. My wife asked me how I liked the article. I replied that the idea was great but the story could be done better. Move some sentences around so that the paragraphs don't say the same thing. That night I woke up to the sound of wonderful music and then it stopped. Someone said "Now listen". And the song was sung to me. It repeated a couple of times. It was the same idea as the article I read earlier. The voice said, "How could you say the story could have been done better. Everyone will write the same story in a different way depending on their experiences and style. That's arrogant". Then the music started again and the chorus rose up and was really cool. In the morning I sang the song over and over in my head and tried to remember it. I wrote the words down and tried to write the music, not knowing how to do it. Sure I know how to read music, but I don't know how to write it. It took about a week to get the melody line down, and more than another week to get some harmony and a bass line. That's how it went. It's not as magical as the song I heard in my sleep, but the theme is the same...God wants be be your everything.

Drawing up a Violin Outline

I know I touched on this on about my second post, but since I've found my printer is not accurate I figured I'd draw one up by hand...just for fun. The photo shows how I go about it. If I'm using a poster it would be full size. This is a photo of a violin in David Rattray's book Masterpieces of Italian Violin Making. I like the looks of it a lot. Besides the frontal photos it gives dimensions and even some thicknesses. It doesn't have arch profiles, but I may be able to come up with something there. The first thing I do is draw lines through the center, bouts, and corners. Then I try to figure out what relationships they have. For the overall length you can use the real overall length, the length of the mold (with the blocks in) or the pin length. On this one that would be 353mm, 344mm and 334mm, about. Whatever one works on the violin you're drawing at the time is the right one. There was a neat article about how Strad and other Italian makers positioned their f holes by Alvin King that will give you some ideas, not only on the f holes, but also relationships that may come in handy. The lower eyes are always around 5:3 or 3:2 or phi the golden number down from the top. Sometimes the apex of the triangle formed by the eyes is the same number up from the bottom. Other relationships that may not be common for us were used often back then. When we think of angles we think of numbers like sines or cosines or tangents. They would set a divider to the relationships and come up with dimensions with no math at all. I draw it up after figuring out the relationships and then check it by laying the drawing on top of the photo on my lightbox. It won't ever match perfectly, but bad spots will be obvious. Changing a few things will get it good enough. Now I can draw it up full size on the drafting table and see how it looks.

Violin Outlines

I took the Red Maple ribcage off the mold the other day. Putting it under the Birch one I was surprised at how different they were in outline. I know I used two different molds for them, but I didn't think they were that different. I was going to make an assembly board up. A new idea I've had bouncing around in my head, but haven't tried yet. I thought if I had the outline of the violin on a board I could glue the back side of the ribs onto the board in the proper location. I could have holes in it to locate the pins, and help drill them straight. I could mark the overhang and glue the back on. Take the belly off, mark the overhang of the back. I would then get the plates almost done. Then I could glue the belly on the ribs. I could glue the bass bar on using it, and area tune the plate. Then I could cut the neck mortise, and set the neck, and glue it on. Then I could take it off the assembly board and glue the back on. I know this is not the way it is done. But my wife says my vanity license plate should be YBNORML. Anyway, neither violin fits the outline that I used to make it's mold with, even though it was made on the mold. They were tight on the mold. Was a bit of an ordeal to pry them off. Strange stuff. How do you make a board with a cut out in it when the ribs don't conform to the pattern? Then I started measuring. The printout of the form is not to size! I printed it two ways, the top in portrait and the bottom in landscape, and taped them together. None of the dimensions match the dimensions in AutoCad. My printer isn't that precise. When you draw out the form in the first place you notice that the original is wacked out of shape. I guess it isn't surprising that mine are wacked out too.
Want's the point of this whole post? Sometimes our grandiose plans never quite come together. Getting the right plan. Going to the right school. Getting a job in the right company. The right spouse, the right car, the right house. The list goes on and on. The problem with plans is they have a future. When you make them, and obtain them they are the past. We live in the present. Only the present. And it is the only thing we have any control over. What we do with what we're faced with right now is the only thing that will make a difference. The only thing that will help is to have God at your side with every choice. Not only the tough choices, when you're at the edge of your rope. All of them. I wrote a song about that. Anyone want me to share it?

Plates of the Birch Violin

I popped the plates of the birch violin off the ribs today. Now I can start tuning them up. This is my starting point: The belly is 76g and rings at 382. It is solid with no f holes or bass bar. The stiffness number is 11.1, quite stiff. The slab birch back has a rather low ring note of c - 263 and weighs 123g for a stiffness number of 8.5, also rather low. I'm sure the belly ring note will drop in pitch, but right now they are almost a fifth apart. There is another rather strong overtone on the back at g 392 as well, so they sound pleasing when tapped back to back. It's a starting point anyway. I think the low back ring tone is a characteristic of the slab birch. It sounds like good soundwood, rustles when rubbed with the fingers and all, just has a lower pitch. The photo show the piece of foam I use to find the tap tone. Laying the plate right side up and tapping in the center gives you mode 5, the ring tone. Laying the plate upside down and tapping on the top or bottom gives mode 2, I think. Tapping with the plate in the same position on the side of the upper or lower bouts gives mode 1. For the belly mode 1 is 93 mode 2 is 190 mode 5 is 382. The back mode 1 is 86, mode 2 is 131 mode 5 is 263. So it's Gb2 Gb3 G4 for the belly and F2 F3 and C4 for the back.
I just finished reading a great book. No, I didn't read it at the grocery store. Well I did in read the first 4 chapters or so there, but then my wife took it out of the library for me. It is The Shack, by William P. Young. I think it is one of the finest books I've ever read. If you haven't read it pick up a copy. You won't be sorry.

Gluing the Liners

I'm gluing in the liners now. You can see the box of tiny clamps I have. I don't remember how much they cost. I bought them at an Amish flea market for 6 or 8 for a dollar, I think. I put 9 on each side of the top bout...12 on each side of the bottom. The c bouts are already done, but I have enough clamps to do all the liners on a side. Liners are one of the things that aren't made out of a specific kind of wood. Some people say that willow wood is the best. Some use only spruce. I've seen people use walnut. These ones are Yellow Poplar, I think. I've made all my linings from wood I scavenged out of pallets at work. I find a light piece that "rings" nice. I tap every piece of wood I see. If it is really light, and rings clearly and with a high pitch I check it out closer. I want to find a piece that I can cut the linings on the quarter. I don't know if they are supposed to be that way, but that is the way I do it. They seem easier to bend that way. Another board I've used is American Sycamore. I've made some backs out of Sycamore so I used the Sycamore linings on them. They look really cool. Both the Sycamore and the Yellow Poplar bent very nicely. I had no idea what kind of wood either of these were until I got them home and smoothed them up with a plane. The piece of wood I've used for the top block, and also the bottom block on this one, was also scavenged. I think that piece was willow. It's gone now, so I have to keep my eyes pealed now for block wood too.

I've made amends!

Dah? That's what I thought when I realized my violin isn't done yet. Why not pop the offending rib off and re-glue it the right way. A little water and heat on the iron, and the rib was turned inside out. I'm so used to running parts on the lathe. If you mess that up it's time for another piece of stock. The joint still isn't what I'd like to accomplish, but it's a little better. At least the flame looks better. Now it's on to the linings on this one.
I also have the Birch violin ready to glue the purfling in. I had one little piece break out between the edge and the groove. Better than I've fared before when I didn't put a light size of glue around the edge first. The chunk is on the bench, I just haven't glued it on yet. This one is the first time I marked the f holes and made the arching fit them, instead of doing the arching and then just pasting the f holes on. From what I remember (it's been a while since I was working on the arching) it is about .5mm or so thicker than the pattern right now. This one has a heavy, hard slab Birch back, and a light, low density Englemann belly. That is the suggested combination according to Nigel Harris to make a violin that sells fast. We'll see about that.

Where do I hide?

Where can I hide? I purposely left the bottom joint to the last step to avoid a couple problems I had in the past, and then made a worse mistake, and a second rate joint besides. As the photo shows, (now that's a dumb idea), I reversed the flame angle. In my only defense I will state that this was the first ribset I did with flames on them. I did plan it out. I did make sure that the angle went the same all the way around. But I must have bent one of the C bouts the wrong way, so when I bent the lower bout to match, it made it backwards. I've never seen that done before. The flame may change on the C bouts. People have cut the button off. I've never seen the flames reversed on the bottom. If anyone has seen it, please let me know.
Hiding is what we want to do when we make a mistake that we're ashamed of. The fact that we're ashamed of it is a good thing. At least we have some shame. But hiding doesn't solve anything. (If anyone knows a good, acceptable way to....hide....the bad rib joint/flame reversal let me know). Getting things out in the open is the only way to go. Admitting your failings is only admitting that you are human, and not God. Sometimes I feel more human than most. Even if you are successful in hiding something, you still know it. If you know it, God knows it. So fess up. Straighten out your crooked paths. My mistake is out in the open, but it's only a violin. If it was something I was doing on the sly, for my own gain..that is a serious human failure. In that case hiding still won't work. Jesus said that all that is done in the dark, or whispered, will be brought out in the light, and shouted from the mountaintop. There is no where to hide.