Its time to get started on my first acoustic guitar build. Before I can do any work on the actual guitar, I need to make a few jigs and fixtures to facilitate the building process. The first one will be the mold for the body. The mold is a very important piece because it is used to hold the sides of the body in its exact shape while many operations are completed. It ultimately determines the final shape of the instrument so its important to have this ready before doing any work on the top and back plates.
I’ll be making the mold from 3 layers of 3/4″ MDF. MDF is very flat and stable and will work well for this mold. I’ll begin by making a master of 1 side, by cutting out one of my paper plans and attaching it to a piece of acrylic. By creating a master, I know that all of my pieces will be identical and both sides will be symmetrical. After creating the master, I used that to cut out 6 duplicates in the MDF. I glued them all together making a very strong laminated mold. After some cleanup sanding, I attached some latches to the ends to hold the 2 halves together. Finally, I drilled some alignment holes in the joint between the 2 halves, and glued in a dowel that the pieces would align themselves to.
With the outer mold completed, I needed to make some spreaders for the inside of the mold. These are used to hold the sides tight to the inside of the mold. They are connected with some turnbuckles that are used to tighten the spreaders. These are also made out of 3 layers of MDF, and they match the inside of the mold. With the mold and spreaders completed, I can now move on to the next steps.
I want to give a couple shout outs to a few people that have helped me out a lot with this project so far. Thank you to luthiers Matt Zimbelman, and Eric Schaefer. Matt is a luthier who is local to me and took the time to allow me to see his shop and answer a ton of questions. Check out his work HERE. Eric is a luthier from Pennsylvania. He has a ton of great videos on his YouTube channel as well as Online and In Person courses where he teaches guitar building. I’m currently working through his online course myself and its a great way to get started in acoustic guitar building. Check out Erics site HERE. Thanks you to Matt and Eric. I really appreciate your help.
With the molds done, Its time to get working on a couple more jigs for this build. Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to check out the build video below.
— Affiliate Links to Products Used —
Titebond 2 Wood Glue – https://amzn.to/3BV2dEG
Irwin Bar Clamps – https://amzn.to/3M1CU8f
Rikon 10-305 Bandsaw – https://amzn.to/3viny9N
Mirka Gold Sanding Discs – https://amzn.to/3JULdkB
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